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HARVARD  ECONOMIC  STUDIES 

PUBLISHED  UNDER  THE   DIRECTION  OF 
THE  DEPARTMENT  OF  ECONOMICS 

VOL.  XXIII 


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A    PA(JK    FROM    A    DOMESTIC    SIIOEMAlvEU'S    ACCOUNT    B(J()K. 


THE  ORGANIZATION  OF  THE 

BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

IN  MASSACHUSETTS  BEFORE  1875 


BY 


BLANCHE  EVANS  HAZARD 

PROFESSOR  OF  HOME  ECONOMICS 
IN  CORNELL  UNIVERSITY 


CAMBRIDGE 
HARVARD  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

LONDON:   Hn\iPHREY  MILFORD 
0X70KD  Untveksiti  Pekss 

I92I 

Rrprintfil  with  thr  prrinission  of  liars  an!  University  Press 

JOHNSON  KKI'klNI"  COKI'OKA  I  IDS      JOHNSON   Kl.l'KI  N  I    C  <  ).M  I'AN  "j    MP. 
ni    Fifth  Avenue.   New   York,   N.   Y.    iooo<  Hcrkelev  Scuinre  Mouse,  l^indoM,  W.   i 


COPYRIGHT,  1921 
HARVARD  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 


History  of  American  Economy :  Studies  and  Materials  for  Study 

A  series  of  reprints  of  the  Important  studies 

and  source  books  relating  to  the  growth  of  the 

American  economic  system. 

General  Editor:  William  N.  Parker 


First  reprinting,  1968,  Johnson  Reprint  Corporation 
Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


TO  THE  MEMORY 

OF  MY 

FATHER  AND  MOTHER 


PREFACE 

Introductory  Survey  of  Materials,  Methods  and  Scope  of 

THIS  Study  of  Facts  Concerning  the  Organization  of  the 

Boot  and  Shoe  Industry  in  Massachusetts  before  1875 

The  development  of  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  of  Massachu- 
setts proves  to  be  an  interesting  and  productive  field  for  economic 
investigation,  not  merely  because  its  history  goes  back  to  colonial 
days  as  one  of  the  leading  industries  of  the  states,  but  more 
especially  because  the  evolution  of  industrial  organization  finds 
here  an  unusually  complete  illustration.  The  change  from  older 
stages  to  the  modem  Factory  Stage  has  been  comparatively 
recent,  and  survivals  of  earlier  forms  have  existed  within  the 
memory  of  the  old  men  of  today.  Sources,  direct  or  indirect,  oral 
and  recorded,  can  be  woven  together  to  establish,  to  limit,  and  to 
illustrate  each  one  of  these  stages  and  the  transitions  of  their 
various  phases. 

Materials,  and  Difficulties  in  Collecting  them 

The  materials  used  as  the  basis  of  the  conclusions  given  here 
have  been  gathered  at  first  hand  within  the  last  ten  years,'  by  the 
writer,  in  the  best  known  shoe  centres  of  Massachusetts,  i.e., 
Brockton,  the  Brookfields,  the  Weymouths,  the  Braintrees,  the 
Randolphs,  and  Lynn.  The  collection  and  use  of  such  written 
and  oral  testimony  has  been  attended  with  difficulty.  No  New 
England  shoemaker  of  a  former  generation  has  dreamed  that 
posterity  would  seek  for  a  record  of  his  daily  work.^   Only  inad- 

'  From  1907-1917. 

'  Exceptions  to  this  did  not  occur  until  about  1880,  when  David  Johnson  of 
Lynn,  and  Lucy  Larcom  of  Beverly,  began  to  write  in  prose  and  poetry  about  the 
shoemaker's  homely  daily  life.  Since  then  ncwspajM;r  reporters  have  become  active 
in  getting  such  dramatic  details  as  the  Blake-McKay  and  the  Howe-Singer  rela- 
tions afforded,  or  the  rise  of  Henry  Wilson,  of  Natick,  from  the  cobbler's  bench  to 
the  vice-presidency  of  the  United  States. 


VI  PREFACE 

vertently  have  the  pages  of  account  books,  kept  to  help  in  "set- 
tling" with  neighbors  and  customers,  bills,  and  letters  giving 
amounts  and  addresses,  been  left  for  us.  These  records,  however, 
are  scarce  and  fast  becoming  scarcer.  The  spring  and  fall  house 
cleanings  and  the  demolition  of  old  shops  to  give  place  to  new 
factories  are  destructive  to  valuable  papers  of  this  kind,  and  even 
where  an  old  attic  still  harbors  them,  oftentimes  molding  and 
fading  under  leaking  roofs,  they  are  generally  difficult  of  access. 
The  recollections  of  old  men  and  women  who  have  worked  on 
shoes,  in  producing  or  distributing  them,  are  even  more  precari- 
ous. Such  people  are  often  confused  by  specific  questions,  even 
when  the  investigator  is  not  a  stranger  to  them.  Their  confidence 
can,  as  a  rule,  be  restored  only  when  the  appearance  of  any  special 
course  of  questioning  has  been  abandoned.  The  material  which 
is  thus  gathered  comes  imbedded  in  unrelated  matter  with  Httle 
perspective,  and  with  much  provinciaHsm ;  yet  it  is  the  most  valu- 
able, as  it  is  the  most  vital  that  can  be  secured.  I  have  prosecuted 
such  inquiries  among  the  older  inhabitants  in  a  number  of  Massa- 
chusetts towns,  not  only  where  the  industry  now  exists,  but 
where  scattered  shops,  the  "  ten-footers  "  of  the  domestic  period 
of  shoemaking,  are  the  only  visible  remains  of  a  once  flourishing 
local  trade. 

Besides  this  oral  and  written  evidence,  there  are  available  also 
public  official  records,  hke  town  reports,  parish  books,  and 
custom-house  papers;  newspaper  files  with  the  advertisements 
of  auction  sales  of  boots  and  shoes,  of  domestic  and  imported 
hides,  of  demands  for  apprentices  and  journeymen,  of  saiHng 
dates  for  vessels,  and  of  western  despatch  or  express  com- 
panies; centennial  and  anniversary  addresses,^  and  occasional 
local  newspaper  or  trade  paper  reports  of  old  men's  recollections. 

^  For  example,  a  dedicatory  address  delivered  by  Mr.  Loren  W.  Puffer  at  the 
Plymouth  County  Court-house,  by  giving  facts  about  Shepherd  Fiske,  the  agent  for 
Governor  Bowdoin  of  Massachusetts,  whose  blast  furnace  at  Bridgewater,  in  Ply- 
mouth County,  supplied  cohorns  and  grenobles  for  use  in  the  colonial  wars  as  well 
as  cast-iron  kitchen  implements  for  local  consumption,  furnished  substantial  clues 
for  a  study  of  the  iron  business  in  that  locality  now  so  famous  for  its  shoe  industry. 
Upon  investigation,  an  explanation  was  found  for  the  tardy  development  of  the 
Domestic  Stage  in  the  local  shoe  industry.  The  small  shops,  where  nails  and  other 


PREFACE  vii 

The  contemporary  official  documents  and  newspapers  give 
little  of  direct  value,  but  serve  to  give  the  general  setting  of  the 
community's  industrial  activity.  The  local  addresses  and  reminis- 
cences are  nearly  if  not  actually  contemporary.  Though  tinctured 
and  limited  by  personal  and  local  pride,  by  inaccuracy,  and  by 
fallacious  reasoning  as  to  cause  and  effect,  they  are  full  of  sugges- 
tion, and  help  in  the  appreciation  of  facts  found  in  other  places 
or  other  relations. 

Scope 

The  information  thus  gathered  seemSj-Dn  analysis,  to  confirm 
inductively  and  with  definite  evidence  of  the  transitions,  the 
stages  of  evolution  set  forth  by  Karl  Biicher.^  In  the  boot  and 
shoe  industry  of  Massachusetts  before  1875,  four  stages  of  pro- 
duction may  be  definitely  traced.  Although  the  stages  are  dis- 
tinct as  to  characteristics  and  essential  features,  they  are  not  so 
as  to  time,  for  overlaps  and  survivals  occur.  The  household 
economy  or  Home  Stage,  for  instance,  characteristic  of  frontier 
conditions,  was  early  followed  by  the  Handicraft  Stage,  which 
prevailed  until  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century.  The  Domes- 
tic Stage  of  industrial  organization,  with  its  successive  and  over- 
lapping phases,  was  well  under  way  before  the  Revolution,  and 
lasted  to  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  giving  place,  about 
1855,  to  the  Factory  Stage,  which  passed  into  its  second  phase  by 

1875- 

ACKNOWTEDGMENTS 

Neither  the  research  work  just  described  nor  this  constructive 
use  of  the  materials  thus  gathered  could  have  been  accomplished 
without  the  constant  and  unstinted  aid  and  the  inspiration  of 
Mr.  Edwin  F.  Gay,  Dean  of  the  Harvard  Graduate  School  of 
Business  Administration.  To  him  and  to  the  score  of  octogenarian 

small  iron  pieces  were  made  by  domestic  workers  and  their  apprentices,  gave  way  to 
the  shoemakers'  "  ten-footers  "  only  when  the  iron  industr>'  had  develof>ed  stronger 
competitors  and  advanced  to  the  Factory  Stage.  Even  then,  the  tool  making 
"  habit  "  surv'ived  and  North  Bridgewatcr  (Brockton)  was  famous  for  its  mechani- 
cal inventions  and  manufactures  for  the  shoe  industry  before  it  was  known  as  a 
shoe  making  centre. 

*  Biicher,  Karl:  Die  Entstehung  der  Volkswirtschaft. 


Vlll  PREFACE 

shoemakers  who  have  given  generous  help,  the  author  gladly  ac- 
knowledges her  indebtedness  and  gratitude.  To  Professor  Albert 
B.  Hart  of  Harvard,  who  gave  to  the  author  her  fundamental 
training  in  the  use  of  historical  sources  which  made  this  research 
possible,  like  acknowledgment  is  due. 

This  manuscript  in  going  through  the  press  has  had  the  pains- 
taking care  and  interest  of  Professor  Charles  Hull  of  Cornell 
University. 


CONTENTS 

CHAITEB  PACE 

I,  Home  and  Handicraft  Stages 3 

II.  Domestic  Stage.  Putting-Out  System,  17 60-1 85 5.  Phase  i, 

1760-1810 24 

III.  Domestic  Stage.    Phase  2,  1810-1837 42 

IV.  Domestic  Stage.    Phase  3,  1837-1855 65 

V.  Factory  St.\ge.    Phase  i,  1855-1875 97 

VI.  The  Human  Element  in  the  Boot  and  Shoe  Industry  .  127 

APPENDICES 

AITENDIX 

I.  Processes  on  Shoes  in  a  Modern  Factory 159 

II.  Modern  Shoe  Repairing 168 

III.  Mediaeval  Shoemaking  Tools 169 

IV.  Partial  Contents    of    the  Delightful,   Princely  and 
Entertaining  History  of  the  Gentle  Craft 170 

V.    A  CONTEJfPORARY    ACCOUNT    OF    NeW    ENGLAND  TRADES  IN 

1650 170 

VI.  The  Charter  of  the  Company  of  Shoemakers,  Boston, 

1648 171 

Vn.  Excerpts  from  the  Timothy  White  Papers i73 

VTII.   Excerpts  from  the  George  Reed  Papers i73 

IX.  Some  Typical  Details  of  the  Early  Political,  Religious, 

AND    FiNANCLAL    HiSTORY    OF    FoUR    MASSACHUSETTS    ShOE 

Centres ^7^ 

X.   Excerpts  from  the  Southworth  Papers 183 

XI.  Excerpts  from  the  Breed  Papers 185 

XII.  Newspaper  Advertisements  for  THE  Shoe  Industry  .    .    .  188 

XIII.  Newspaper  Advertisements  —  Tanneries 190 

XIV.  Exemption  FOR  Shoemakers  during  the  Revolution  .    .    .  192 

XV.  Excerpts  from  the  Wendell  Papers I93 

iz 


X  CONTENTS 

APPENDIX  PAGE 

XVI.   Excerpts  from  the  Batcheller  Papers 200 

XVII.   Pages  from  the  Batcheller  Accounts 202 

XVIII.  The  Barber  Statistics  of  Massachusetts  Towns     .  207 

XIX.  Pages  from  the  Henry  Wilson  Accounts 213 

XX.  Excerpts  from  the  Robinson  &  Company  Papers     .  219 

XXI.  Natick  Statistics 220 

XXII.  Excerpts  from  THE  Howard  and  French  Accounts  .   .  221 

XXIII.  Excerpts  from  the  Gilmore  Accounts  showing  Bank- 
ing Facilities 230 

XXIV.  Excerpts  FROM  THE  Kimball  AND  Robinson  Papers  .    .  231 
XXV.  Excerpts  from  the  Twitchell  Papers 236 

XXVI.  The  McKay  Machine 245 

XXVII.  Excerpts  from  the  Batcheller  Accounts 246 

XXVIII.  Samuel  Drew,  the  Shoemaker  Metaphysician  .   .   .  256 

XXIX.  Carey,  an  English  Bagman 258 

XXX.  An  English  Story  of  the  Birth  and  Training  of  St. 

Crispin  and  his  Brother 258 

XXXI.  A  French  Story  of  the  Birth  and  Training  of  St. 

Crispin  and  his  Brother 261 

XXXII.  The  Pious  Confraternity  of  Brother  Shoemakers  262 

XXXIII.  The  Shoemaker's  Glory,  a  Merry  Song 264 

XXXIV.  Brothers  of  St.  Crispin 265 

XXXV.  Attitude  of  Crispins  toward  New  Help 266 

XXXVI.  Ritual  of  the  Crispins 266 

XXXVII.  The  Crispins  at  Burrell  and  Maguire's  Factory    .  267 

Sources 268 

Index 273 


ORGANIZATION  OF  THE  BOOT  AND  SHOE 

INDUSTRY  IN   MASSACHUSETTS 

BEFORE  1875 


CHAPTER  I 

HOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES 

Introduction: 

Essential  tools. 

Essential  processes. 
Home  Stage: 

Phase  I.     Purely  "  home-made  "  boots. 

Phase  2.     Itinerant  cobblers'  work. 
Summary  of  the  Home  Stage  of  the  Boot  and  Shoe  Industry. 
Handicraft  Stage: 

Phase  I.     Bespoke  work. 

Phase  2.     Extra  sale  work. 
Brief  Survey  of  the  General  Economic  Conditions  of  early  Massachusetts  in  which 

the  Home  and  Handicraft  Stages  of  the  Shoe  Industry  were  Developed. 
Randolph,  Brockton,  Brookfield,  and  Lynn. 

Essential  tools 

In  a  modern  shoe  factory,  there  are  one  hundred  separate  opera- 
tions performed  in  making  one  shoe.^  So  many  parts  and  such  in- 
tricate machinery  are  deemed  proper,  if  not  necessary,  for  even  a 
cheaply  made  shoe  today,  that  it  is  difficult  for  a  layman  to  under- 
stand the  technique  involved,  much  less  to  undertake,  as  his 
great  grandfather  did,  calmly  and  yearly,  to  make  a  shoe.  Shoe- 
making,  however,  can  be  and  used  to  be  a  very  simple  industry. 
The  tools  and  processes  of  shoemaking  in  all  countries  and  ages 
prior  to  1830  were  few  and  easily  mastered.  Skill  and  good  ma- 
terials made  excellent  shoes  fit  for  a  princess;  but  the  same  tools 
and  processes  were  useful  for  making  the  crudest  shoes  such  as 
mediaeval  serfs  wore.    From  time  immemorial,  there  have  been 

2  parts  to  a  shoe:  an  upper  and  a  sole; 

4  processes  in  making  a  shoe:  cutting,  fitting,  lasting,  bot- 
toming; 

8  tools  necessary  for  making  a  shoe:  knife,  awl,  needle, 
pincers,  last,  hammer,  lapstone,  and  stirrup. 

•  Just  as  a  matter  of  contrast  and  not  with  the  need  of  real  comprehension  on 
the  part  of  the  reader,  those  one  hundred  operations  are  given  in  Appendix  I, 
and  a  description  of  a  modern  shoe  repair  outfit  in  Appendix  U,  in  order  to  show 


4  ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Essential  processes 

These  four  processes  could  be  performed  adequately  with  just 
those  eight  tools  by  any  frontier  farmer  in  his  colonial  kitchen. 
From  1620  up  to  1830,  there  were  no  machines  for  preparing 
leather,  nor  for  making  shoes  in  Massachusetts,  or  anywhere.  A 
lapstone  and  a  hand-made  hammer  were  used  for  pounding  the 
leather;  a  single  knife  '  for  cutting  both  sole  and  upper  leather. 
An  awl  to  bore  holes,  and  a  needle  or  a  bunch  of  bristles  were 
necessary  for  sewing  the  shoes.  This  process  was  called  fitting, 
and  consisted  of  sewing  the  parts  of  the  upper  together.  When 
the  upper  was  fitted,  it  was  slipped  on  the  last,  which  had  an 
insole  tacked  to  it,  and  its  lower  edge  pulled  over  this  wooden 
form  tightly  with  pincers  until  it  could  be  fastened  temporarily 
with  nails.  Then  the  outer  sole  was  either  sewed  or  pegged  on  to 
this  lasted  upper.  The  last  in  the  shoe  was  meanwhile  held 
firmly  in  place  by  a  strap  or  stirrup,  which  passed  over  it  and 
down  between  the  shoemaker's  knees  where  the  shoe  rested,  and 
was  held  taut  under  his  left  foot. 

Home  Stage 

For  the  details  of  the  simple  processes  of  making  boots  and 
brogans  in  the  Home  Stage  of  the  Boot  and  Shoe  Industry  of 
Massachusetts  in  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  we 
have  a  rare  but  satisfactory  store  of  sources  made  possible  by  the 
combination  of  survivals  and  the  good  memories  and  keen  interest 
of  men  hving  in  the  first  decade  of  the  twentieth  century.  Their 
recollections  have  been  based  upon  childhood  experiences  before 
the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  in  isolated  communities  in 

the  advance  in  technique,  the  increase  of  complexity,  and  the  division  of  labor 
which  have  all  been  made  in  order  to  save  human  labor  and  to  secure  uniformity 
in  shoemaking. 

1  The  well-to-do  particular  shoemaker  of  the  same  period  might,  however,  have 
a  whole  series  of  knives  sticking  along  the  edge  of  his  bench,  right  at  hand  to  suit 
his  several  needs  in  cutting  thick  or  thin,  soft  or  tough  leather,  a  flat  surface  or  the 
rounding  edge  of  a  sole.  One  of  them  he  used  as  a  skiver  to  thin  off  the  leather,  one 
for  a  heeler  and  another  for  paring.  See  Appendix  III  for  mediaeval  tools  mentioned 
in  St.  Hugh's  Bones. 


HOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES  5 

New  England,  where  the  industrial  conditions  and  customs, 
typical  of  previous  centuries,  had  survived. 

Phase  I.     Purely  home-made  boots 

From  their  accounts,^  it  is  possible  to  construct  a  mental 
picture  of  the  way  the  country  boy  stood  on  the  bare  kitchen 
floor  or  on  a  paper  and  had  the  shape  of  his  foot  traced  with 
charcoal  or  chalk.  Sometimes  he  merely  had  its  length  marked, 
and  he  watched  his  father,  looking  over  the  family's  meagre  col- 
lection of  lasts  with  breathless  anxiety,  lest  he  could  not  find  a 
last  that  came  even  somewhere  near  that  measure.  By  the  time 
fall  had  come  bringing  frost  and  frozen  ground  where  the  boy  was 
doing  his  farm  chores,  this  barefoot  son  was  vitally  interested 
in  having  some  shoes  made  without  delay. 

There  was  little  to  be  decided  after  the  last  was  found.  The 
shoes  would  be  either  high  boots  or  brogans,  as  low  shoes  were 
then  called.  They  would  be  made  of  roughly  tanned  cowhide 
and  be  black  or  russet  in  color. 

Phase  2.     Itinerant  cobblers'  work 

Old  men  have  remembered  also  a  second  phase  of  the  Home 
Stage  of  shoe  production,  where  the  itinerant  cobbler  appeared, 
going  from  house  to  house  with  his  kit  of  tools  and  a  few  lasts 
rolled  up  in  a  leather  apron  which  was  slung  over  his  back,  or 
trundled  in  a  wheelbarrow  along  with  his  cobbler's  bench.  From 
stories  told  me  by  other  old  people,^  I  have  realized  how  much 

1  Mr.  Jerome  C.  Fletcher,  who  was  born  and  brought  up  in  Littleton,  New 
Hampshire,  and  Mr.  Hiram  S.  Worthley,  of  Strong,  Maine,  have  been  especially 
helpful  in  their  reminiscences.  They  have  unconsciously  illustrated,  by  moving 
their  hands  and  feet  to  suit  the  action  while  they  talked,  and  by  imitating  the  tones 
which  memory  recalled,  the  very  methods  and  atmosphere  of  shoemaking  in  their 
New  England  homes.  They  have  made  the  listener  feel  their  childhood's  expectancy 
and  keen  interest  in  the  annual  pair  of  new  boots.  Mr.  Worthley  used  to  seem  to 
see  spread  before  him,  as  he  talked,  the  family  supply  of  leather.  "There  is  the  hide 
of  one  cow  for  top  leather,  the  hide  of  one  ox  for  sole  leather,  and  one  calf  skin  for 
best  shoes,  and  sheep  skin  for  their  trimmings." 

^  Miss  .\bby  Cole,  of  Warren,  R.  I.,  and  Mr.  Benjamin  Martin,  of  Bristol,  R.  I., 
have  told  me  that  in  their  community  as  late  as  i8;;i,  shoes  were  made  in  their 
houses  each  year  by  Gardner  Sisson,  of  Touissit.   They  owned  that  he  was  rather 


6  ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

more  desirable  it  was  considered  to  have  the  family's  shoes  made 
by  such  an  itinerant  cobbler,  rather  than  by  the  father  and  older 
brothers.  This  cobbler  was  either  a  journeyman,  "  whipping  the 
cat  "  after  his  apprenticeship  to  some  master  in  a  larger  town  was 
completed,  or  a  self-taught  farmer  of  their  own  community,  who 
could  make  more  at  this  trade  than  at  farming.  His  standard 
was  apt  to  be  higher,  his  experience  wider,  his  number  of  lasts 
greater,  and  his  knowledge  of  leather  deeper  than  that  of  any 
other  farmer  in  the  village.  The  second  phase  of  this  Home 
Stage  had  its  difficulties,  however,  for  the  delays  filled  by  im- 
patient waiting  for  the  itinerant  cobbler  sent  some  farmers  in 
despair  back  to  trying  their  own  unskilled  hands  at  shoemaking 
to  meet  the  family  needs,  though  they  knew  that  the  shoes  they 
now  turned  out  must  suffer  comparison  with  those  made  in  the 
neighborhood  by  real  shoemakers. ^  Incidentally  they  thus  kept 
alive  the  first  phase  of  shoemaking. 

The  head  of  a  family  had  not  only  to  use  foresight  in  engaging 
betimes  the  cobbler,  as  well  as  the  tailor,  but  he  had  to  forecast 
also  his  own  demand  for  leather.  Every  community  had  its  bark 
house  and  tanning  pits,  where  either  hemlock  or  oak  bark  was 
thrown  in  to  cover  and  to  cure  the  hides.  The  process  of  tanning 
seems  to  have  been  very  simple  then,  for  into  the  rough  pit,  dug 
in  the  corner  of  the  farm,  was  thrown  a  layer  of  skins,  then  a 
layer  of  hemlock  bark,  another  of  skins,  and  more  hemlock  bark. 
For  sole-leather  they  used  oak  bark,  if  they  could  get  it,  rather 

out  of  style  in  182 1  and  that  people  knew  they  could  go  to  Providence,  less  than 
twenty  miles  away,  and  buy  store  shoes,  but  they  liked  to  have  Sisson  come  to  the 
house  because  he  made  shoes  so  well.  They  told  me  the  delight  that  they,  as  chil- 
dren, experienced  in  seeing  grandfather  take  out  the  shoemaker's  bench  from  the 
attic,  place  it  near  a  window  selected  with  reference  to  good  light  in  the  kitchen, 
and  then  in  seeing  Sisson  unwrap  the  tools  which  he  had  brought  in  his  leather 
apron. 

1  "  The  Answer  to  Abiel  Kingsbury's  Prayer,"  a  story  by  Miss  Virginia  Baker 
in  the  Atlantic  Monthly  for  June,  1913,  is  an  intensely  interesting  realistic  account  of 
a  family,  waiting  for  the  coming  of  a  cobbler  to  the  vicinity  of  Rehoboth  in  southern 
Massachusetts.  Several  children  were  out  at  toes  and  Abiel,  a  widower,  distracted 
by  the  attention  of  a  maiden  lady  who  wanted  to  take  care  of  him  and  mother  his 
children,  had  not  had  enough  foresight  to  hire  the  cobbler  ahead.  At  last  he  turned 
to  the  old  Indian  woman  in  the  Hollow  and  engaged  her  to  make  moccasins  for  the 
children,  but  decided  to  hold  out  for  himself  until  the  itinerant  cobbler  came. 


HOME  AND  HANDICILAFT  STAGES  J 

than  hemlock  bark.  Once  a  year  the  vat  was  opened,  and  the  bark 
and  leather  taken  out.  The  owner  of  the  vat  was  currier  also,  so 
that  he  took  the  hair  off  the  skin,  and  dressed  the  leather  by 
pounding  it  on  a  lapstone  and  scraping  it.  He  kneaded  with  oil 
the  skins  used  for  upper  leather,  and,  in  general,  he  prepared  it 
by  the  same  crude  methods  which  primitive  people  of  all  times 
and  centuries  have  employed. 

At  first  the  man  who  owned  the  tanning  pit  used  to  tan  skins 
just  for  the  immediate  use  of  his  own  and  his  neighbor's  family. 
One  can  easily  see  the  chance  for  growth  of  this  industry  until 
the  tannery,  begun  by  the  farmer-butcher-currier  as  a  by-industry 
to  save  waste  products,  or  as  a  mere  convenience  for  the  neigh- 
borhood, became  more  important  than  the  business  of  carrying 
on  the  farm  itself.  As  real  craftsmen  set  up  in  business  in  the 
town  to  do  shoemaking  under  the  second  or  Handicraft  Stage  of 
the  shoe  industry,  they  probably  demanded  a  more  regular  supply 
and  a  higher  standard  of  leather  than  the  old,  occasional  by- 
industry  had  secured  for  the  itinerant  cobbler.  The  shoemakers 
who  had  come  from  larger  towns,  especially  seaports,  were  used 
to  working  on  a  certain  amount  of  imported  leather  and  would  be 
critical  customers  of  the  village  tannery  product.  It  is  rather 
hard  to  decide  whether  a  successful  tannery  was  accountable  for 
the  superior  development  of  a  local  shoe  industry  in  various  New 
England  villages,  or  vice  versa.  The  fact  was  mentioned  some- 
times in  town  records  when  a  newly  arrived  shoemaker  had  come 
from  a  community  which  was  known  for  its  tannery.*  Tanning 
and  shoemaking  were  both  clearly  rooted  as  by-industries  at 
least  in  every  New  England  village  before  the  earliest  colonial 
conditions  of  shoemaking,  i.  e.,  the  Home  Stage,  gave  way  to  the 
Handicraft  or  Masterworkman  Stage. 

Summary  of  the  Home  Stage  of  the  Boot  and  Shoe  Intdustry 

During  the  Home  Stage  in  the  shoe  industry  in  Massachusetts, 
shoes  were  made  only  for  home  consumption.    There  was  no 

^  Cf.  p.  22  for  the  coming  of  Ezra  Batcheller  to  North  Brook6eld  from  Grafton, 
Massachusetts,  in  1810.  Note  also  the  mention  in  the  Suffolk  Registry  of  Deeds  of 
the  trade  of  the  man  who  bought  land,  if  he  were  a  cordwainer  or  a  currier,  a  yeo- 
man or  a  cooper,  a  gentleman  or  a  merchant. 


8  ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

market  for  them.  The  standard  was  "  the  best  you  could  make 
or  have."  The  farmer  and  his  older  sons  made  up  in  the  winter 
around  the  kitchen  hearth  the  year's  supply  of  boots  and  shoes 
for  the  family  out  of  leather  raised  and  tanned  on  his  own  or  his 
neighbor's  farm.  This  did  not,  or  could  not  happen,  until  the 
shoes  worn  over  from  England  were  past  repair,  and  until  in  his 
frontier  life  the  colonist  had  secured  a  permanent  cabin  and  had 
raised  some  cattle  whose  hides  might  be  tanned.  How  much  the 
individual  man,  woman,  and  child  suffered  from  the  change  to  the 
rough  home-made  shoes  we  shall  probably  never  know,  and  rela- 
tively the  item  of  the  discomfort  of  a  pair  of  shoes  must  have  been 
slight.  One  can  easily  imagine  the  wife  or  daughter,  and  even  the 
grown  son  being  told  to  stop  grumbling  over  a  poor  fit,  and  to  be 
thankful  that  he  had  any  shoes  at  all. 

Handicraft  Stage 

Phase  I.     Bespoke  work 

The  transition  from  the  Home  to  the  Handicraft  Stage  came 
gradually  not  only  in  each  town,  but  even  in  the  experience  of  a 
single  shoemaker.  One  day  he  might  work  as  an  itinerant  cob- 
bler on  a  wage  in  a  farm  house,  and  the  next,  he  might  work  in 
his  own  house,  for  a  bargained  price,  on  shoes  for  a  customer, 
who  might  or  might  not  supply  the  leather,  but  in  either  case, 
agreed  in  advance  upon  a  price  for  the  product  turned  out  by  the 
shoemaker.  Thus  the  Home  Stage,  with  its  chief  characteristic 
of  production  merely  for  home  consumption,  gave  way  to  the 
Handicraft  Stage  with  its  characteristic  of  work  done  for  a  market, 
on  the  specific  demand  of  a  definite  customer.  Such  work  came  to 
be  called  "  bespoke  work."  Though  the  future  owner  of  the 
shoes  could  no  longer  have  oversight  of  the  worker's  use  of  the 
leather  he  had  brought  to  the  shop,  the  standard  of  work  was 
probably  higher  in  most  cases.^ 

1  Mr.  John  R.  Commons  called  attention  in  his  "  American  Shoemakers  "  (p.  42, 
Q.  J.  E.,  November,  1909),  to  the  fact  that  the  master  shoemakers  by  working  in 
shops  instead  of  private  kitchens  were  open  to  the  inspection  of  fellow  crafts- 
men, as  the  itinerant  cobbler  had  never  been,  hence  higher  standards  could  be 
maintained. 


HOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES  9 

The  official  records  ^  of  Massachusetts  reveal  some  of  the 
struggles  and  grievances  of  early  shoemakers  and  master  crafts- 
men at  this  time  of  transition.  They  wished  to  cease  being  itiner- 
ant cobblers  at  the  farmer's  beck  and  call,^  and  to  work  in  their 
own  shops  on  leather  which  they  provided,  and  at  a  price  which 
they  themselves  set.  A  compromise  was  made  by  the  legislators 
whereby  the  master  could  stay  in  his  own  shop,  but  he  had  to 
make  up  the  leather  that  was  brought  by  the  customer  who 
wished  to  provide  his  own,  and  he  had  to  work  at  a  "  fair  price." 
This  supposedly  was  to  be  set  by  public  opinion  which  shoemak- 
ers and  customers  alike  had  a  chance  to  make. 

In  thickly  settled  communities  this  Handicraft  Stage  in  its 
first  phase  came  sooner  and  also  passed  out  sooner,  especially 
in  the  seaports  around  Massachusetts  Bay.  While  we  have  seen 
it  surviving  in  the  isolated  back  water  country^  even  past  the 
middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  it  had  passed  out  in  Lynn,  the 
Weymouths,  and  other  eastern  Massachusetts  towns,  nearly  a 
century  earUer.  In  those  same  places,  it  had  come  also  a  century 
earher,  for  as  early  as  1654  when  Edward  Johnson  pubb'shed  his 
"  Wonder  Working  Providence  of  Sion's  Savior,"  *  he  recounted 
shoemaking  among  the  numerous  crafts  being  plied  in  eastern 
New  England.  In  his  account  we  see  an  array  of  craftsmen 
doing  their  special  work  as  artisans  and  depending  upon  farmers 
for  the  food,  which  would  come  directly  or  indirectly,  as  pay  for 
their  services,  as  early  as  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century 
in  a  few  of  the  older  and  more  urban  communities.  It  was  not 
till  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  however,  that  the 
Handicraft  Stage  was  prevalent  in  the  shoemaking  industry  in 
New  England. 

A  mediaeval  shoemaker  would  not  have  found  a  Massachusetts 
shoemaker's  shop  of  that  date  very  strange  in  itself.  The  master's 

'  See  Appendi-x  V  and  VI  for  a  detailed  quotation  from  these  records. 

*  See  the  story  of  Paul  Hathaway  in  chapter  VI,  p.  134. 

'  Cf.  mention  of  Littleton,  New  Hampshire;  Strong,  Maine;  and  Frcnchtown, 
Pennsylvania  in  this  text,  pp.  5  and  178. 

*  Cf.  Appendix  V,  for  quotations  from  Edward  Johnson's  "  Wonder  WorkinR 
Providence  of  Sion's  Savior  in  New  England."  Edition  published  in  1654,  p.  207 
of  Book  3. 


lO        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

kit,  materials,  and  helpers  would  have  all  been  familiar  in  both 
kind  and  number.  But  the  absence  of  gild  officers  and  regulations 
would  have  seemed  most  unnatural,  for  there  were  no  gild  regu- 
lations in  these  shoe  shops  of  colonial  Massachusetts  except  in 
Boston.^  The  gild  organization  was  rare  enough  in  the  English 
colonies  to  be  exceptional.  Philadelphia  and  Boston,  receiving 
more  new  European  shoemakers,  and  being  trade  centres  from 
the  earliest  times,  developed  and  maintained  it.  Pubhc  opinion, 
added  to  experience  gained  by  watching  the  actual  wearing  quali- 
ties of  shoes,  made  standards  for  shoemaking  grow  higher  as  com- 
munity conditions  became  less  isolated  and  farmers'  purses 
showed  the  effects  of  industrial  prosperity.  Then,  too,  there  was 
the  spur  of  competition  on  workmanship  imposed  upon  the  work- 
men by  the  European-made  shoes  which  never  ceased  to  be 
imported  by  the  well-to-do,  and  to  be  brought  over  by  the  new- 
comers. To  do  the  custom  work  for  the  squire  of  the  town  meant 
in  colonial  Massachusetts  what  it  did  to  make  shoes  for  the 
princess  in  mediaeval  France.  An  apprentice  lad  in  Boston  prob- 
ably dreamed  of  making  and  trying  on  shoes  for  the  Governor's 
daughter  in  much  the  same  state  of  dazed  expectancy  as  the 
shoemaker  of  fiction,  known  as  the  disguised  prince  apprentice 
of  Kent,  experienced  when  he  made  shoes  for  Ursula,  the  Roman 
Emperor's  daughter.^ 

Working  with  the  custom  shoemaker  in  his  shop,  there  were 
generally  two  or  three  apprentices  and  two  or  more  journeymen. 
The  former  were  bound  for  a  term  of  seven  years  just  as  lads  had 
been  in  Europe  since  the  fourteenth  century.  They  had  to  help 
the  dame  of  the  household  as  well  as  the  master  of  the  shop,  and 
doubtless  sang  the  same  refrain  apprentices  used  to  sing  in 

England. 

However  things  do  frame, 

Please  well  they  Master,  but  chiefly  they  Dame. 

^  Cf.  the  Charter  of  Boston  Shoemakers,  pubUshed  in  full  in  the  records  of 
Massachusetts  Bay  in  New  England,  vol.  iii,  p.  132  and  printed  as  Appendix  VI 
of  this  treatise. 

*  For  the  details  of  this  shoemaker's  tale,  see  The  Delightful  Princely  and  En- 
tertaining History  of  the  Gentlecraft  of  Shoemakers,  pp.  57-73.  Published  in  Lon- 
don, 1725.    See  also  Appendix  IV. 


HOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES  i  i 

They  longed  for  the  time  when  they,  hke  the  journeymen  they 
had  seen  come  and  go  at  their  master's  shop,  would  "  shroud  St. 
Hugh's  Bones  ^  in  a  gentle  lamb's  skin  "  and  start  on  their  travels 
earning  their  first  money  by  "  whipping  the  cat  "  as  itinerant 
cobblers  in  lonely  country  houses  until  they  found  regular  work 
in  some  master's  shop.  All  through  both  phases  of  this  Handi- 
craft Period,  the  custom  shoemakers  taught  their  apprentices 
faithfully  to  master  all  the  processes  and  to  make  the  whole  boot 
or  shoe.  No  suggestion  or  even  prophecy  of  division  of  labor,  such 
as  became  characteristic  in  the  third  or  Domestic  Period,  had 
entered  the  shoemaker's  ken;  and  today  in  Europe  where  custom 
shoes  are  made  in  master's  custom  shops,  the  term  of  apprentice- 
ship is  still  seven  years.  In  the  schools  of  New  England  of  the 
eighteenth  century  the  boys  were  taught  to  write  the  form  of  ap- 
prentice indenture  papers  which  were  in  current  use  in  England, - 
so  that  both  future  masters  and  apprentice  lads  became  famiUar 
with  those  terms  along  with  their  Rule  of  Three  and  the  injunc- 
tions of  the  Complete  Letter  Writer. 

Phase  2.     Extra  sale  work 

No  one  year  can  mark  the  transition  from  the  first  to  the  second 
phase  of  the  Handicraft  Period,  the  change  from  the  purely  be- 
spoke work  to  the  partly  sale  work,  for  though  these  phases  were 
inspired  by  different  ideas,  one  and  the  same  man  as  shoemaker 
made  the  transition  personally  without  knowing  himself  that  it 
was  a  transition.  The  time  was  bound  to  come  in  the  increas- 
ingly prosperous  Commonwealth  of  Massachusetts  when  the 
numerous  trained  master  shoemakers  in  any  one  town  would 
have  to  compete  with  each  other  for  customers,  or  else  drift  out 
from  towns  like  Boston  and  Lynn  to  get  work  on  the  frontier. 
Interesting  stories  are  told  of  the  way  Josiah  Field,  of  Boston, 
came  to  Randolph  and  taught  the  shoemakers  there  the  first 
"  city  ways."  Since  probably  the  best  shoemakers  did  not  need 
to  drift  to  the  country,  the  standards  which  the  others,  as  masters, 

'  A  shoemaker  tied  up  his  tools  in  his  leather  apron.    See  legend  and  song,  pp. 
40-57,  History  of  the  Gentlecraft,  etc.     Quoted  in  Appendix  III. 

'  Cf.  Ebenezer  Belcher's  Exercise  Book  of  1793.   Harvard  University  Archives. 


12        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

would  pass  on  to  their  journeymen  and  apprentices  in  turn  would 
be  something  less  exact,  and  somewhat  out  of  touch  with  town 
standards,  though  the  lack  of  sale  shoes  then,  either  in  the  stores, 
or  on  the  feet  of  fellow  townsmen,  would  keep  his  village  cus- 
tomers in  happy  ignorance  of  the  fact. 

The  making  of  unordered  shoes  for  stock  gradually  became  a 
practice.  At  first,  even  in  the  larger  towns  like  Lynn  and  Boston, 
where  the  best  shoemakers  were  grouped  and  could  secure  the 
pick  of  journeymen  and  apprentices,  there  must  have  been  times 
when  shoes,  made  for  a  definite  customer  as  bespoke  work  under 
the  first  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Stage,  were  spoiled  by  poor  work 
or  mismeasurement,  or  left  on  the  hands  of  the  master  workman 
through  caprice  or  failure  to  appear  on  the  part  of  the  customer. 
This  was  probably  the  first  entering  wedge  in  hundreds  of  cases 
for  the  second  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Stage,  i.  e.,  a  time  of  extra 
sale  work,  and  it  repeated,  at  an  interval  of  four  or  five  centuries, 
the  history  of  the  shoemaking  craft  and  trade  in  different  parts 
of  Europe.  The  sale  of  such  a  pair  of  shoes  could  not  fail  to  sug- 
gest a  new  possibility  to  custom  makers.  This  new  market 
helped  to  relieve  the  fear  of  a  like  misfortune  in  the  future,  and  to 
give  an  idea  of  what  they  could  do  in  slack  times  when  the  ap- 
prentices and  journeymen  might  fairly  be  expected  to  "eat  their 
own  heads  off"  to  the  shoemaker's  loss  while  he  was  waiting  for 
definite  orders  from  specific  customers.  In  such  a  case,  the 
craftsman  ^  ventured  to  make  up  stock  which  he  had  on  hand, 
thus  employing  this  otherwise  wasting  labor,  and  then  tried  to 
dispose  of  the  shoes  either  in  his  front  window ;  or,  lest  by  doing 
that  he  compete  with  himself  when  customers  came  to  his  shop, 
he  put  them  in  the  village  grocery  store  to  help  out  his  account, 
just  exactly  as  the  farmer's  wife  of  today  puts  in  some  eggs  or  a 
few  jars  of  preserves  which  she  ventures  for  sale  in  more  or  less  of 
a  gambling  spirit.^  Since  the  market  was  uncertain  and  slow  for 
this  extra  work,  both  the  stock  and  labor  may  frequently  have 

*  Cf.  Hall's  Book  of  the  Feet,  a  History  of  Boots  and  Shoes,  pp.  81-84,  for  similar 
manufacture  of  sale  shoes  in  England. 

^  Shoemakers  were  not  alone  in  sending  "  extra  sale  work  "  in  the  way  of  shoes 
to  the  general  store  of  the  village.  Account  books  of  such  stores  show  that  ginghams 


HOME  AND  HANDICILiFT  STAGES  I  3 

been  below  the  standard  used  in  custom-made  shoes.  It  might 
naturally  happen  that  the  demands  would  be  more  steady  and  the 
profits  could  be  relatively  higher  for  this  lower  cost  work  when 
once  it  was  introduced  into  the  community,  even  when  it  was  all 
done  at  the  direction  of  the  same  master  shoemaker  in  the  same 
shop  and  by  the  same  workers,  by  simply  using  different  stand- 
ards and  different  grades  of  stock. 

With  this  idea,  when  once  started,  of  making  some  extra  sale 
shoes  to  Jill  out  time  at  custom  work,  shoemakers  were  bound  to  be- 
come increasingly  pleased,  especially  those  who  lived  in  villages 
too  far  from  Boston  to  attract  non-resident  customers,  but  near 
enough  to  send  their  surplus  product  into  Boston.  A  seemingly 
typical  though  belated  case,  with  all  its  local  flavor,  can  be  followed 
in  detail  in  the  bills,  letters,  account  books,  and  oral  traditions 
of  Quincy  Reed,  of  Weymouth.  He  expected  to  be  a  shoemaker 
just  as  his  great  grandfather  William,  who  landed  in  Weymouth 
in  1635,  and  his  grandfather  and  father  had  been.  In  1809,  the 
father  was  a  master  with  custom  work,  doing  some  sale  work 
for  local  consumption.  As  Quincy  tells  the  story:  "My  brother 
Harvey  began  it  by  taking  chickens  to  Boston.  He  had  a  pair  of 
chaise  wheels  in  the  barn,  and  putting  on  a  top  piece,  loaded  her 
up  and  drove  to  town.  He  hung  some  shoes  on  the  chaise  and  we 
sold  them  in  Boston.  We  did  not  have  a  wagon  then  —  I  can 
remember  when  there  was  n't  a  wagon  in  this  part  of  the  town, 
and  between  here  and  East  Abington  there  was  only  one  pair  of 
wheels.  All  the  shoes,  before  we  began  business,  were  carried  into 

and  linens  and  worsteds  were  left  by  weavers  quite  regularly  just  as  butter  and 
cheese  were. 

The  custom  of  women  of  the  present  day,  who  knit  or  crochet,  or  paint  dinner 
cards  and  valentines  as  a  by-industry  and  place  them  for  sale  in  stores  organized 
and  maintained  for  other  purposes,  thus  saving  the  charge  or  cost  of  rent  and  service 
as  well  as  securing  a  likely  place  in  which  to  expose  their  wares,  is  an  interesting 
survival  rather  than  revival  of  an  old  custom  well  known  in  the  later  years  of  the 
eighteenth  century  and  the  first  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  centur>-  when  staple 
wares,  like  cloth  and  shoes,  were  exposed  for  sale  in  the  same  way. 

Interesting  records  of  stockings  as  "  sale  "  goods,  and  of  contemporary  custom 
shoemaking,  are  contained  in  the  Timothy  White  papers  reprinted  in  the  Nantucket 
Historical  Collection.  We  seem  to  have  in  them  the  account  of  a  farmer  who  taught 
school  and  made  shoes.  See  Appendix  VII.  Cf.  .'\ppendL\  VIII  for  the  George 
Reed  papers. 


14       ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Boston  in  saddle  bags.  We  hired  a  store  of  Uriah  Cotting,  at  133 
Broad  Street,  and  fitted  it  up.  Then  I  used  to  keep  a  chest  of 
shoes  in  a  cellar  near  Dock  Square  and  on  Wednesday  and 
Saturday  would  bring  out  the  chest  and  sell.  I  got  fifteen  and 
twenty  dollars  a  day  by  it  in  1809.  I  was  sixteen  and  my  brother 
was  eighteen  years  old  then.  We  moved  into  the  Broad  Street 
store  with  two  bushels  of  shoes.  I  used  to  cut  out  what  would 
promise  to  be  $100  worth  a  day.  We  could  n't  have  them  made 
equal  to  that,  but  I  could  cut  them.  One  day  I  cut  350  pair  of 
boot  fronts  and  tended  store  besides.  Most  of  the  shoes  were 
made  by  people  in  South  Weymouth.  We  had  nearly  every  man 
there  working  for  us  before  long.  Used  to  bring  out  the  sole 
leather  swung  across  the  horse's  back  in  those  days.  We  did  n't 
have  any  capital  to  start  with  except  father's  assurance  that '  the 
boys  are  all  right  and  will  pay  their  debts.'  When  we  got  of  age 
Harvey  paid  father  $1000  for  his  time  and  I  paid  him  $3000.  By 
then  we  had  got  up  a  stock  of  $10,000,  and  I  have  the  inventory 
now  to  prove  it.  We  are  getting  $2  for  the  best  shoes,  and  $1.25 
to  $1.50  for  the  West  India  shoes.  .  .  ."  ^ 

These  pages  from  the  Reed  papers  have  been  quoted  in  detail 
because  they  are  important  evidence  of  a  typical  transition  from 
the  second  or  sale  work  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Period  to  the 
opening  phase  of  the  new  Domestic  Period  of  the  shoe  industry.^ 

^  These  Reed  papers  are  kept  in  the  old  Reed  house  in  South  Weymouth,  Mass., 
where  Mr,  Quincy  Reed  generously  allows  students  access  to  them. 

*  Bryant,  in  his  Shoe  and  Leather  Trade  for  One  Hundred  Years,  mentions  re- 
tail and  jobbing  houses  in  Boston  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century  giving  most 
conclusive  proof  that  the  custom  work  had  been  gradually  giving  place  to  large 
amounts  of  sale  work  under  the  Domestic  System  for  export  before  1800.  To  quote 
his  facts  in  part:  "  In  1796,  Perez  Bryant  &  Company  had  a  shoe  store  at  No.  66 
Ann  Street,  Boston,  and  a  store  in  Savannah,  Georgia,  to  which  it  made  large  shio- 
ments.  This  Perez  Bryant  was  a  native,  like  Levi  Leach  (see  p.  138),  of  Halifax, 
Mass.  Silas  Tarbell  also  had  a  store  in  Ann  Street,  Boston.  By  1798,  E.  Thayer 
&  Company  had  a  store  there  in  Ann  Street  and  made  large  shipments  to  Charles- 
ton, S.  C.  and  to  Savarmah,  Ga.  Amos  Stetson  had  a  large  store  in  Mercantile  Row, 
and  made  similar  shipments.  Both  Stetson  and  Thayer  were  from  Randolph,  and 
the  former  gave  a  handsome  town  hall  to  his  native  town." 

Asa  Hammond's  store  was  at  14  Ann  Street  in  1798.  Samuel  C.  Torrey  was  a 
tanner  in  Pleasant  Street,  Boston,  and  had  his  tan  yard  there. 

These  facts  would  make  us  feel  that  Reed  was  simply  one  among  many  followers 
of  the  pioneers  in  the  Boston  export  trade. 


EOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES  15 

They  show  how  custom  work,  as  the  essential  feature  of  the  shoe 
trade,  gave  way  whenever  and  wherever  there  was  developed  an  ^ 
accumulated  stock  of  extra  sale  shoes,  with  capital  and  enter-  ^ 
prise  enough  to  make  shoemakers  ^  turn  into  producers  for  un- 
known customers.  In  Massachusetts,  this  new  period  in  the  shoe 
industry  was  contemporary  with  the  Revolutionary  War  period. 
Roughly  speaking,  the  Home  and  Handicraft  Periods  had  been 
contemporary  with  the  settlement  and  colonial  eras  in  Massa- 
chusetts, that  is,  with  frontier  conditions  which  were  primitive 
compared  to  those  which  the  settlers  left  behind  them  in  Europe. 

Brief  Survey  of  the  Economic  Conditions  of  Early 

Massachusetts,  in  which  the  Home  and  Handicraft 

Stages  were  Developed 

One  has  to  recall  vividly  colonial  conditions  and  get  into  full 
sympathy  with  their  demands  and  limitations,  to  understand  the 
reversion  to  these  Home  Stage  productions  made  by  the  European 
colonists  who  had  left  in  their  homes,  whether  in  England,  Hol- 
land, France  or  Germany,  a  well  developed  organization  of  in- 
dustry for  all  the  crafts  ranging  even  in  small  towns  from  the 
saddlers  to  the  silversmiths,  from  the  weavers  to  the  candle  mak- 
ers. There  the  Handicraft  system  in  its  gild  form,  already  merg- 
ing rapidly  into  the  Domestic  System,  had  taken  the  place  of  the 
Home  Stage  production  some  centuries  before.  Probably  few 
settlers  who  came  to  America  at  any  time  in  the  seventeenth  or 
the  eighteenth  centuries  were  accustomed  to  the  mediaeval  gild 
system,  and  certainly  few  of  them  knew  of  the  Home  Stage  unless 
they  came  from  frontier  towns  and  isolated  valleys  in  Europe, 
which  they  scarcely  would  have  left  for  similar  frontier  life  in 
America.  So  most  of  the  colonists  took  up  for  the  first  time  the 
Home  Stage  production,  which  is  always  typical  of  frontier  life 
and  isolated  homes,  whether  in  a  mediaeval  manor,  a  colonial 

'  Quincy  Reed  must  have  been  cordially  disliked  and  distrusted  by  custom 
shoemakers  who  had  none  of  his  ambitions.  He  approached  the  industry  not  as  a 
shoemaker,  but  as  a  trader.  A  custom  shoemaker  would  hate  this  newcomer  as 
much  as  he  had  the  outgoing  itinerant  cobbler  —  considering  both  as  makers  of 
"  bad  ware." 


1 6        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

farm  house  or  a  log  hut;  typical  alike  of  the  absence  of  stores  and 
cash,  of  diversified  industry  and  spare  money,  of  division  of 
labor,  of  means  of  exchange;  in  short,  typical  of  industrial  con- 
ditions in  a  community  that  is  young.  The  Home  Stage  of 
production  went  hand  in  hand  with  pioneer  conditions  in  Mas- 
sachusetts and  in  New  England  in  general. 

We  need  to  have  a  picture  that  gives  the  details  ^  and  settings 
in  the  economic  and  social  Hfe  of  several  of  these  Massachusetts 
towns  in  order  to  bring  such  conditions  before  our  eyes.  Much 
has  been  written  of  the  early  political  and  religious  Ufe  and  prob- 
lems of  these  same  towns,  but  Httle  about  the  economic  or  indus- 
trial. Yet  between  the  lines  of  the  documents  which  have  been 
preserved  carefully  because  they  related  to  political  and  religious 
affairs,  we  can  get  the  story  we  are  seeking. 

The  commercial  life  and  the  industrial  life  of  each  community, 
whether  seaport  or  inland  town,  whether  in  full  contact  with  sur- 
rounding communities  or  isolated,  always  determined  the  eco- 
nomic hfe  within  its  bounds.  The  stages  and  their  phases  of  indus- 
trial organization  are  independent  of  time  ,2  and  of  advance  in 
other  places.  Each  community's  development  has  determined 
not  only  its  local  industries,  but  also  the  time  when  each  industry 
should  appear  and  should  pass  from  one  phase  to  another.^ 

A  new  Massachusetts  town  in  the  early  colonial  days  was 
settled  either  directly  from  Europe,  or  from  another  colony,  or 
from  a  parent  town.  Either  the  desire  for  more  land  or  more 
religious  and  social  freedom  led  settlers  out  of  the  regular  settle- 
ment into  a  neighboring  fertile  valley,  or  into  a  tract  remote 
enough  to  escape  the  poHtical  and  religious  system  of  the  town, 
though  not  of  course  of  the  Massachusetts  General  Court,  which 
made  laws  alike  for  every  town  and  village.  Its  surveillance 
could  not  be  as  detailed  or  strict  in  the  Uttle  new  frontier  settle- 
ments, so  that  there  was  greater  freedom  to  go  hand  in  hand  wdth 
the  greater  discomforts,  because  by  the  remoteness  of  the  settle- 

>  Cf.  Appendix  VIII,  IX,  X,  for  such  details  from  the  original  sources. 
^  See  Appendix  VIII. 

»  Biicher,  Die  Entstehung  der  Volkswirtschaft,  chapter  IV,  in  Wickett's  Eng- 
lish translation  of  the  3d  German  edition,  pp.  150-184. 


HOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES  1 7 

ment,  the  distance  "  to  mill  and  to  meeting  "  became  greater  and 
acted  as  a  barrier  to  frequent  intercourse  with  the  traders  and  the 
neighbors  in  the  old  town.  While  for  political  and  rehgious  pur- 
poses the  colonist  went  back  to  the  old  centre  on  foot  or  on  horse- 
back, for  social  and  economic  life  he  was  forced  to  depend  upon 
his  own  family  and  farm.  This  condition  of  things  held  until 
there  were  enough  settlers  in  the  valley  or  on  the  hilltop  to  decide 
in  a  public  meeting  to  have  a  new  village  of  their  o'v\ti.  The 
colonists,  however,  undertook  first  to  be,  not  towns  or  villages, 
but  just  precincts  of  the  parent  town.  They  clung  to  the  main 
road  from  Boston  or  Plymouth,  the  kernels  of  the  first  two  colo- 
nies of  Massachusetts  Bay,  even  while  they  pushed  their  way 
forward  to  some  neighboring  settlement.  This  is  the  way  that 
Randolph  as  a  part  of  Braintree,  and  Brockton  as  a  part  of 
Bridgewater,  originated,  and  these  two  towns  have  been  studied 
in  detail  along  with  Lynn  and  Brookfield,  because  they  have  be- 
come leading  centres  of  the  shoe  industry  in  Massachusetts.^ 

Randolph 

From  the  old  town  of  Braintree,  which  lay  on  the  Bridgewater 
Path  from  Boston  to  Taunton  and  Plymouth,  there  had  come 
settlers  enough  toward  the  south  to  form  a  village  by  Cochato 
River  and  Tumbling  Brook  in  the  first  quarter  of  the  eighteenth 
century. 

On  details  of  its  growth  and  its  problems  such  as  are  given  in 
Appendix  IX  and  taken  from  parish  and  town  records  of  Braintree 
and  Randolph  we  have  to  depend  to  understand  the  economic 
conditions  of  a  community,  which  became,  before  the  century  was 
over,  one  of  the  leading  shoe  towns  of  Massachusetts. 

By  1762,  either  by  the  sale  of  surplus  produce,  or  by  wage- 
labor,  or  by  the  income  of  grist  and  saw  mills,  the  South  Pre- 
cinct of  Braintree  was  earning  money  as  well  as  making  its 
living.  New  demands  for  labor  came  in  with  the  odd  cash  to 
pay  for  it. 

'  Even  at  the  risk  of  seeming  discursive  such  details  of  local  histor>'  as  can 
supply  a  background  for  the  understanding  of  the  social  and  economic  conditions  of 
these  towns  are  given  in  Appendix  IX. 


i8 


ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 


There  must  have  been  by  this  time  a  non-farming  class,  or  at 
least  a  non-land-owning  class  who  were  artisans.  Some  of  these 
we  know  were  shoemakers.  Before  the  Revolutionary  War,  there 
were  numerous  pits,  and  a  regular  bark  house  ^  for  tanning,  at  the 


/r//70/v 


Randolph  in  the 
CocHATo  River  Valley 


south  end  of  the  town  on  the  Bridgewater  road,  and  another  at 
the  north  end  of  the  town  known  as  Thomas  French's  vat.  The 
shoes  of  the  South  Precinct  were  made  of  leather  raised,  tanned 

'  Bark  pits  for  tanning  may  be  seen  on  map,  p.  176.  The  evidences  of  a  tannery 
and  bark  house  on  the  Wales  estate  in  the  south  end  of  the  town  persisted  into  the 
nineteenth  century.  Built  some  time  before  1770,  the  bark  house  gave  its  name  to 
the  "Bark  house  piece  "  of  land  throughout  the  next  century  in  the  Wales  family. 
Old  Thomas  Wales,  deacon  of  the  first  Randolph  Meeting  House  in  1 731,  was  the 
founder  of  that  Wales  estate  to  the  south  of  the  Hill.  His  son,  Dr.  Ephraim  Wales, 
ist,  who  was  graduated  at  Harvard  in  1768,  had  two  granddaughters,  Annie  and 
Sallie  Wales,  who  were  living  at  this  old  homestead  in  191 5  when  they  gave  me  these 
facts  about  the  pits.  Their  mother,  Polly  Alden,  was  the  daughter  of  the  Silas 
Alden,  ist,  who  will  be  mentioned  again  as  an  early  entrepreneur.  When  Polly 
Alden  married  Dr.  Ephraim  Wales,  2d,  and  came  to  live  at  the  old  Wales  home, 
the  piece  of  land  a  little  distance  back  of  the  house  and  enclosed  by  a  stone  wall 
was  full  of  pits  where  leather  had  been  tanned  on  the  "  bark  house  piece,"  and  she 
used  to  explain  them  thus  to  her  daughters  Annie  and  Sallie. 


HOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES  1 9 

and  fashioned  on  the  latter  spot  by  handicraftsmen  before  the 
Revolution.  This  settlement  by  the  Cochato  River  had  passed 
through  the  Home  Stage  of  the  organization  of  the  shoe  industry, 
and  was  well  advanced  into  the  Handicraft  Stage  before  it  be- 
came politically  independent,  or  took  its  share  in  the  Revolu- 
tionary War.  By  curious  coincidence,  some  of  its  citizens  learned 
much  about  their  trade  even  while  they  served  in  the  Conti- 
nental cause.  ^ 

On  March  9,  1793,  Randolph  ^  was  incorporated  as  a  town 
just  south  of  Braintree.^  It  was  no  longer  a  mere  farming  com- 
munity that  was  self-sufficing;  it  was  interested  economically  as 
well  as  politically  in  the  outside  world  where  it  sought  markets 
wherein  to  sell  as  well  as  buy.  The  Handicraft  period  of  shoe- 
making  closed  with  the  Precinct  days.  Mr.  Silas  Alden  was  man- 
ufacturing boots  in  a  shop  which  stood  on  his  own  land,  the  work 
being  done  by  apprentices  and  journeymen,  but  instead  of  mak- 
ing merely  "  bespoke  work  "  for  different  customers,  as  he  and 
fellow  shoemakers  had  in  the  first  phase  of  the  Handicraft  period, 
he  took  the  boots  and  shoes  to  Boston  for  sale,  carrying  them  in 
saddle-bags  as  he  rode  on  horse  back  over  the  Blue  Hills  through 
Milton. 

Thus  by  the  time  Randolph  had  become  incorporated  as  a 
town,  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  Domestic  Stage 
of  the  shoe  industry  had  appeared  there  in  its  first  phase. 

*  Details  from  Kingman,  who  tells  about  shoemaking  at  Castle  Island,  in  Boston 
Harbor,  where  Massachusetts  Colonial  soldiers  were  stationed  with  English  regu- 
lars, will  be  found  in  his  History  of  North  Bridgewater.    See  also  Appendix  XI\'. 

"^  During  the  last  years  of  the  war  there  was  talk  in  the  village  of  independence, 
not  only  for  the  United  States  of  America,  but  for  the  South  Precinct  of  Braintrce 
as  well.  By  1792,  this  parish  had  formally  petitioned  both  Braintree  and  the  General 
Court  of  Massachusetts  to  be  incorporated  as  a  town,  and  they  had  chosen  to  name 
it  after  Peyton  Randolph,  of  Virginia,  the  First  President  of  the  Continental  Con- 
gress of  1774.  The  petition  was  signed  by  one  hundred  and  twenty  of  the  citizens 
representing  a  population  of  at  least  600  people,  and  was  accepted. 

'  Braintree  was  the  mother  town  not  only  of  the  Cochato  settlement,  which 
became  Randolph,  but  also  of  a  North  Precinct,  which  became  Quincy,  the  home 
of  Presidents  John  Adams  and  John  Quincy  Adams. 


20        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Brockton 

{Formerly  North  Bridgewater) 

Meanwhile  the  town  of  Bridgewater  in  the  Plymouth  colony, 
founded  in  1656,  had  been  undergoing  the  same  sort  of  changes 
as  the  town  of  Braintree.  As  a  parent  town,  it  was  obliged  to 
allow  its  growing  children  to  depart  in  peace,  and  to  give  them 
a  portion  of  its  lands.  The  North  Precinct  (now  Brockton)  was 
situated  along  the  Bridgewater  road,  north  from  Bridgewater, 
and  six  miles  from  Randolph,  which  lay  on  the  direct  road  from 
Bridgewater  to  Boston,  through  Braintree.^ 

A  Hst  of  parish  rates  in  1744  and  of  polls  due  in  1770,  together 
with  the  estimate  of  population  for  1764  give  us  some  definite 
ideas  of  the  growth  of  the  North  Precinct  of  Bridgewater  in  its 
first  fifty  years.  Its  citizens  took  their  share  of  colonial  burdens 
in  Indian  fighting,  not  on  their  own  borders  in  self  defense,  as  in 
the  case  of  the  Brookfield  men,  but  off  on  the  Massachusetts 
frontiers.  We  have  lists  of  those  serving  in  the  French  and  Indian 
War,  and  those  fighting  in  the  Revolution. 

To  the  men  busy  with  getting  cannon  and  shot  for  supplying 
the  Continental  Army,  North  Bridgewater  was  known  as  an  iron 
smelting  and  casting  community. ^  Cabinet  making  and  handle 
shaping  for  iron  tools  were  also  rivals  or  complements  of  farming 
as  an  industry  in  the  precinct.  Spinning  and  weaving,  tanning 
and  shoemaking,  though  not  industries  for  outside  consumption, 
went  on  in  every  farm  house  from  the  infancy  of  the  precinct 
until  it  had  passed  through  the  years  of  the  Revolution.  The 
tanneries  gradually  became  larger  and  fewer,  and  ceased  to  be 
mere  "  neighbor's  pits."  The  custom  of  making  shoes  for  one's 
own  family  was  given  up.  The  North  Bridgewater  shoe  industry 
seems  to  have  been  in  the  Handicraft  Stage  during  or  soon  after 
the  Revolution,  for  trained  shoemakers  were  working  for  custom- 
ers at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century.  It  would  appear  that 
North  Bridgewater  was  later  than  Randolph  in  developing  the 
tendency  to  "  sale  shoes  "  which  led  out  of  the  Handicraft  and 
into  the  Domestic  Stage  of  the  shoe  industry.    Perhaps  the  iron 

*  See  Appendix  IX  for  details.  ^  See  footnote,  p.  vi  of  Preface. 


HOME  AND  HANDICRAFT  STAGES  2 1 

works  and  woolen  mills  offered  a  better  chance  of  profit  and  ab- 
sorbed even  the  small  amounts  of  capital.  It  may  be,  however, 
that  the  records  of  the  first  sale  shoes  were  not  kept,  yet  when 
we  come  to  details  about  Micah  Faxon, ^  of  Bridgewater,  who  was 
making  sale  shoes  in  1811,  we  find  that  he  was  regarded  by  the 
next  generation  in  his  community  as  a  pioneer.  Though  only  sLx 
miles  away  from  Randolph,  Bridgewater  entered  the  Domestic 
Stage  a  score  of  years  later  than  its  neighbor. 

Brookfield 

Still  further  west  in  Massachusetts  the  town  of  Quabaug,  or 
Brookfield,  was  passing  through  the  Home  and  Handicraft 
Stages  of  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  in  its  colonial  and  Revolu- 
tionary days.  As  Randolph  was  the  child  of  Braintree,  so  Qua- 
baug seems  to  have  been  the  child  of  Ipswich,  an  eastern  seaport 
of  Massachusetts,  but  the  foster  child  of  Springfield,  in  the  Con- 
necticut River  valley.^ 

The  year  1783  found  Brookfield,  as  Quabaug  had  been  re- 
named, the  third  town  in  age,  and  the  first,  as  to  its  wealth  and 
population,  in  the  county  of  Worcester.  It  contained  four  hun- 
dred and  thirty-eight  dwelling  houses  and  three  thousand  one 
hundred  inhabitants,  while  its  neighbor,  Worcester,  had  only  two 
thousand  one  hundred  people.  Even  before  the  Revolution, 
Brookfield  had  developed  the  manufacture  of  woolens  sufficiently 

1  "Mr.  Micah  Faxon  was  probably  the  first  person  that  manufactured  shoes  for 
the  wholesale  trade  in  the  town  of  North  Bridgewater.  He  came  from  Randolph  in 
181 1  (was  one  of  the  South  Randolph  —  Brookville  —  Faxon  family  for  whom 
Ebenezer  Belcher  worked)  and  commenced  cutting  and  making  shoes  in  the  house 
that  was  formerly  occupied  by  the  late  Matthew  Packard,  and  on  the  same  lot  that 
Mr.  Faxon's  house  now  stands.  At  that  time  there  was  no  one  in  town  that  could 
bind  the  vamps  and  put  the  shoes  together,  and  they  were  sent  to  Randolph  to  be 
made.  At  first  he  made  one  hundred  pair  of  fine  calf  spring-heel  shoes  and  carried 
them  to  Boston  on  horseback.  His  first  lot  was  sold  to  Messrs.  Monroe  and  Nash, 
a  firm  on  Long  \\  harf,  Boston,  who  were  among  the  first  to  send  goods  to  the  South. 
When  carriages  came  into  common  use,  he  carried  his  shoes  into  the  city  in  wagons 
and  brought  out  his  own  leather.  The  market-men  and  those  that  carried  wood 
and  other  goods  to  market,  used  to  bring  out  stock  for  him,  which,  of  course,  was 
in  small  lots  at  first."  —  Kingman's  History  0/  North  Bridgruaicr,  p.  405. 

2  Cf.  Appendix  IX  for  details  of  the  eariy  political  and  economic  history  of 
Brookfield. 


22        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

to  make  it,  like  Bridgewater,  with  its  iron  works,  an  illustration 
of  the  American  manufacturing  communities,  which  the  jealous 
English  ParHament  tried  in  vain  to  suppress.  Along  two  rivers 
there  were  enough  good  water  privileges  to  provide  power  for 
owners  of  saw  mills,  grist  mills,  and  woolen  mills  as  well. 

There  is  a  description  of  Brookfield,  made  by  Dr.  Snell,  who 
became  pastor  there  in  1798.  Though  his  account^  as  here  quoted 
was  written  over  fifty  years  later,  it  was  accepted  then  and  it  is 
now  by  other  Brookfield  historians. 

The  inhabitants  were  all  husbandmen.  Even  the  few  mechanics  who 
wrought  at  their  trades  merely  to  supply  town  customers,  were  farmers  upon 
a  larger  or  smaller  scale.  There  was  not  more  than  a  single  mechanic  whose 
wares  were  purchased  abroad;  while  we  were  wholly  dependent  upon  other 
places  for  most  kinds  of  mechanical  business  no  less  than  for  merchandise. 
The  population  of  the  precinct  of  North  Brookfield  was  about  eleven  hun- 
dred, nor  did  it  vary  essentially  for  nearly  thirty  years.  The  forge  and  the 
mills  on  Five  Mile  River  were  the  main  business  centres,  and  Salmon  Dean 
had  a  tannery  in  Spunky  Hollow.  Francis  Stone  had  another  tannery  at 
Waits  Corners,  while  David  Thompson  and  Daniel  Weatherby  had  a  tan 
yard  opposite  the  East  Hill  place.  The  town  supported  four  carpenters,  but 
every  thriving  man  could  hew,  mortise,  and  lay  shingles.  The  cobblers  of 
that  day  were  Ezra  Richmond,  who  had  a  small  shop  in  the  east  part  of  the 
town;  Malachi  Tower,  who  lived  in  the  old  Dempsy  house;  Thomas  Tucker 
and  Abiel  Dean  who  had  benches  in  their  kitchens,  but  used  to  go  round 
to  the  farmers'  houses  in  the  fall  with  their  kit  and  stay  a  week  or  so,  mend- 
ing and  making  the  family  supply  of  shoes. 

When  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  in  Brookfield  passed  out  of 
the  Home  Stage  suggested  by  the  last  facts  quoted  from  Dr. 
Snell,  and  into  the  first  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Stage,  it  is  not 
possible  to  state,  yet  the  transition  may  have  come  before  the 
Revolutionary  War,  and  probably  before  even  the  advent  of  the 
woolen  mills  in  1768.  This  first  phase  of  supplying  boots  made 
to  order  for  actual  customers  seems  to  have  lasted  until  the  first 
decade  of  the  nineteenth  century,  when  OHver  Ward  and  Ezra 
Batcheller  came  from  Grafton  about  1810  and  began  to  work 
on  sale  shoes.  With  the  advent  of  Oliver  Ward,  and  his  manu- 
facture of  sale  shoes,  or  at  least  extra  shoes  to  offer  in  the  local 
general  store,  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  passed  through  the 
second  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Stage,  and  was  on  the  eve  of 

^  Cf.  Temple,  History  of  North  Brookfield,  pp.  266-267. 


HOME  AND  EANDICFLiFT  STAGES  23 

adopting  the  Domestic  System.  Thus  Brookfield  and  North 
Bridgewater  came  to  the  opening  of  the  third  or  Domestic  Stage 
of  their  shoe  industry  at  about  the  same  time. 

Lynn 

Meanwhile  Lynn  had  far  outstripped  every  one  of  these  towns 
in  its  rapid  development,  not  only  of  organizing  the  shoe  industry 
for  production,  but  also  for  trade.  It  had  secured  markets  with 
English  colonies  and  with  England  herself  before  the  Revolution, 
and  had  passed,  as  will  be  seen  in  the  following  detailed  account, 
out  of  the  Handicraft  Stage  into  the  third  stage,  the  Domestic, 
far  in  advance  of  the  other  Massachusetts  towns. 

The  development  of  the  shoe  industry  in  Lynn,  a  seaport  located 
only  a  few  miles  from  Boston,  is  typical  of  that  in  towns  which 
came  in  contact  with  European  and  other  foreign  markets.  There 
were  several  reasons  why  Lynn  should  pass  out  of  the  Home  and 
Handicraft  Stages  of  the  shoe  industry  before  such  towns  as 
Randolph,  North  Bridgewater  and  Brookfield,  but  its  beginnings 
were  practically  the  same  in  economic  conditions  and  problems, 
except  for  its  closer  contact  with  the  coast  and  coast  trade,  which 
lessened  its  industrial  and  intellectual  isolation.^ 

The  arrival  of  two  shoemakers  from  England  in  1635  deter- 
mined Lynn's  chief  industry  for  the  future.  Attracted  by  lands  or 
friends  or  the  Ingalls  tannery,  Philip  Kertland  and  Edmund 
Bridges,^  came  to  Lynn.  They  either  took  apprentices  and  spread 
the  fever  or  found  others  there  in  the  farming  community  all 
ready  to  join  them.  From  then  until  1750,  no  one  seems  to  know 
any  more  about  the  shoemaking  industry  in  Lynn  or  any  of  the 
surrounding  towns.  Probably  it  passed  through  the  Home  Stage 
more  quickly  than  any  other  town  in  Massachusetts,  for,  by  1650, 
if  not  earlier,  it  had  passed  into  the  Handicraft  or  Custom  Stage, 
out  of  which  in  turn  it  passed  before  the  Revolutionary  War, 

'  Cf.  Appendix  IX  for  details  of  the  political  and  economic  history  of  early 
Lynn. 

*  In  spite  of  the  tradition  that  Edmund  Bridges  was  the  second  shoemaker  in 
Lynn,  he  seems  to  have  been  a  blacksmith  rather  than  a  shoemaker  by  trade. 
There  is  a  court  order  of  May,  1647,  about  his  neglect  in  "shoeing  Mr.  Symonds' 
horse." 


CHAPTER  II 

DOMESTIC  STAGE.    PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM,  1760-1855 

Phase  i,  1760-1810 

The  Domestic  Worker  makes  the  complete  shoe,  but  for  a  market,  not  a  con- 
sumer. Export  trade  opens.  The  United  States  tariff  protection  of  shoes  begins. 
Shoe  manufacturers  are  not  always  shoemakers,  but  simply  entrepreneurs  seeking 
profitable  investments. 

Phase  I  defined  and  characterized. 

Rise  of  Phase  i .  Newspapers  as  a  source  of  information  on  the  shoe  industry  — 
as  to  goods,  materials  and  tools,  tan  yards,  imported  hides,  supply  of  shoemakers, 
wholesale  and  retail  trade,  shoes  for  export  to  the  South  and  West  Indies.  Private 
and  official  correspondence  about  shoe  orders;  Wendell  letters  and  accounts;  ac- 
count books  of  Breed,  at  Lynn. 

Summary  of  facts  about  Phase  i. 

Domestic  Stage  —  Putting-out  System 

Phase  I.  Domestic  Worker  still  makes  the  complete  shoe  {about 

1260-1810) 

The  close  of  the  second  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Stage,  with  its 
growing  attention  to  extra  or  sale  work,  appears  so  like  the  open- 
ing phase  of  the  new  or  Domestic  Stage  that  it  is  not  readily  dis- 
tinguished, especially  where  the  handicraft  workman  changed 
naturally  and  gradually  into  the  domestic  worker  employed  by  a 
shoe  merchant,  who,  as  an  entrepreneur,  marketed  the  goods. 
Yet  the  two  stages  are  fundamentally  different.  Just  as  the 
Handicraft  Stage  is  characterized  by  the  direct  dealing  of  the  shoe- 
maker with  his  market,  and  his  dependence  upon  his  own  skill 
and  efforts  in  making  as  well  as  selling,  so  the  Domestic  Stage  is 
characterized  by  the  indirect  dealing  with  the  market  on  the  part  of 
the  shoemaker,  who  is  simply  to  manufacture  the  boots  and  shoes 
which  a  capitalist-entrepreneur  markets  at  his  own  risk  and 
profit,  supplying  in  whole  or  in  part  the  tools  and  materials. 

Three  phases  of  the  century-long  Domestic  Stage  can  be 
traced,  defined,  and  illustrated.  The  first,  coming  gradually  by 
the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  prevailed  in  Massachusetts 

24 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  25 

by  the  close  of  the  Revolution  and  lasted  through  the  opening 
years  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Though  apprentices  and  jour- 
neymen were  employed,  the  less  skilled  and  more  irregular  labor 
of  the  women  and  girls  of  the  family  was  also  utilized.  The 
shoemaker  turned  over  to  the  entrepreneur  the  completed  shoe, 
often  the  combined  labor  of  every  member  of  his  family  besides 
his  apprentices  and  journeymen,  but  with  all  the  processes  done 
in  his  shop  under  his  direction.  This  last  fact,  that  the  domestic 
worker  still  made  the  complete  shoe,  is  to  be  considered  a  special 
characteristic  of  the  first  phase  of  the  Domestic  Stage. 

Rise  of  capital  for  the  shoe  ifidustry 

The  financing  of  the  shoe  industry  is  perhaps  just  as  much  of 
a  characteristic  of  this  first  phase  and  continues  to  be  in  phases 
two  and  three.  In  short,  it  is  the  most  vital  common  factor  in 
the  whole  Domestic  Stage.  For  the  first  time  capital,  in  the 
modern  conception,  was  necessary  in  the  shoe  industry.  Shoe- 
making  in  the  Home  Stage  was  done  by  the  shoemaking  farmer 
for  his  family  to  avoid  spending  money,  and  to  avoid  going 
without  footwear  when  no  stores  or  labor  were  at  his  command. 
Then  the  itinerant  cobbler  appeared  to  work  for  board  and 
lodging  with  or  without  a  small  wage.  He  had  no  stock  or  capital 
involved  save  his  kit  of  tools;  the  farmer-consumer,  as  before, 
provided  the  stock. 

Shoemaking  in  the  Handicraft  Stage  in  its  first  phase  of  ordered 
or  bespoke  work  was  purely  a  matter  of  a  shoemaker's  earning  a 
living,  not  of  seeking  and  making  investments.  Even  in  its  second 
phase  of  sale  work,  it  was  largely  a  question  of  saving  from  waste 
the  spare  time  of  journeymen  and  apprentices,  of  poor  stock,  and 
left-over  pieces  or  of  misfit  stock  left  on  hand,  that  induced 
shoemakers  to  make  sale  shoes.  This  sale  work,  coupled  as  it 
often  was  with  the  expansion  from  a  town  to  a  national  econ- 
omy, with  the  changed  conditions  from  pro\dncial  to  national 
political  and  commercial  life,  was  the  first  taste  of  venture,  or 
risk,  or  profits  on  investments  which  led  over  into,  and  made  pos- 
sible, the  Domestic  Stage  in  the  shoe  industry.  It  was  openly 
one  of  capitaHsm  whether  the  entrepreneur  was  a  shoemaker 


26        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

"  bom  and  bred  "  or  whether  he  was  an  outsider  attracted  by  the 
chance  of  profit  which  the  export  trade  offered  to  the  shoe 
manufacturer. 

The  Domestic  System  and  the  Rise  of  National  Markets  for  the 
English  Colonies  in  America 

Similar  conditions  and  developments  can  be  traced  in  the  trades 
in  England.  The  woolen  industry  and  trade  there,  for  one  illus- 
tration, presents  decidedly  interesting  parallels  to  the  shoe  and 
leather  industry  from  1760  to  1855,  and  even  to  1875  ^^  this 
country.  At  first  and  until  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century, 
all  the  different  branches  of  labor  requisite  for  turning  out  a 
proper  finished  piece  of  cloth  were  carried  on  as  separate  indus- 
tries by  independent  workmen  with  apprentices  and  journejrmen 
in  their  houses.  The  weaver  bought  the  wool  or  yarn  and  made 
cloth.  He  sold  the  cloth  to  a  fuller  who  made  it  into  a  close 
fabric.  The  fuller  then  sold  it  to  a  shearman  who  smoothed  the 
nap  with  his  heavy  shears  and  sold  it  to  the  purchaser.  In  the 
middle  of  the  fourteenth  century,  a  new  class  of  drapers  appeared, 
who  seem  to  have  been  merchants.  They  bought  cloth  of  weavers 
or  of  fullers  and  sold  it  to  customers  in  distant  markets.  This 
was  when  the  considerable  export  trade  in  cloth  began.  Later  the 
clothier  delivered  wool  to  the  weaver,  who  employed  carders, 
spinners,  dyers,  fullers,  and  other  workmen.  The  capitalist-clo- 
thier furnished  the  materials,  arranged  for  the  various  processes, 
and  sold  the  finished  product.  The  weaver  might  actually 
do  his  work  at  home  (domestic  worker),  but  so  far  as  economic 
relations  were  concerned,  he  was  dependent  for  stock  upon  an 
employer  (entrepreneur)  who  later  on  furnished  the  implements 
also. 

Unwin  ^  gives  a  concise  statement  of  the  appearance  of  the 
domestic  system  in  various  industries  in  England,  which  is  apro- 
pos for  students  of  its  advent  in  the  shoe  industry  in  the  late 
eighteenth  and  early  nineteenth  century  at  the  time  of  our  Revo- 
lutionary War,  the  Continental  Wars,  which  affected  our  foreign 

*  Industrial  Organization  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries,  by  George 
Unwin.   Published  at  Clarendon  Press,  Oxford,  1904.    Chapter  I. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  27 

commerce  and  markets,  and  the  War  of  181 2.  Unwin,  speaking  of 
the  advent  of  national  markets  which  made  the  more  important 
industries  freer  to  concentrate  in  favorable  localities  and  lose  their 
local  limitations,  said: 

The  craftsman  might  continue,  as  the  currier  did,  to  work  in  his  own 
home,  using  in  part  his  own  capital,  althought  dependent  for  constant  em- 
ployment upon  the  larger  capital  of  others.^  On  the  other  hand,  he  might 
become  a  mere  wage-earner  in  the  workshop  of  a  capitalist  master,  who 
combined  several  crafts  under  one  direction.  The  domestic  system  was  the 
result  of  the  adoption  of  the  first  of  these  alternatives.  The  second  contained 
the  germs  of  the  factory  system.  Both  forms  of  change  were  resisted  by  the 
craftsmen  whose  independence  was  threatened,  but  whilst  the  opposition 
to  the  second  was  backed  by  a  strong  public  opinion  embodied  in  persistent 
legislation,^  the  first  proved,  in  the  case  of  the  more  important  industries, 
to  be  an  inevitable  necessity  of  progress. 

In  the  American  colonies,  there  was  no  legislative  struggle. 
The  transition  was  allowed  and  oftentimes  not  even  sensed,  since 
in  our  elastic  and  growing  market,  changes  were  easily  made  and 
not  always  recognized  as  important.  This  progress  was  strongly 
desired  by  the  new  capitahst-merchant  class  of  shoe  manufac- 
turers, and  little  feared  by  the  shoemakers.  While  in  England 
the  gild  system  had  emphasized  the  vested  interests  of  the  crafts- 
men, in  the  American  colonies,  shoemakers  did  not  expect  nor 
fear  the  loss  of  their  economic  independence.^  The  shoe  industry 
in  this  country,  therefore,  escaped  struggle  and  legislation  to 

1  Ebenezer  Belcher  and  Samuel  Ludden  are  illustrations  of  just  this  condition. 

Cf.  pp.  46,  48. 

2  Unwin  gives  the  following  as  footnote  to  the  above  mentioned  legislation: 
"The  English  statutes  relating  to  the  leather  industries  afford  the  most  striking  ' 
illustration  of  this.  The  Act  of  13S9  forbade  tanners  to  be  shoemakers  or  shoe- 
makers tanners.  This  was  renewed  in  1397  but  suspended  in  1402.  In  1485  the 
tanners  were  forbidden  to  curry  and  curriers  to  tan.  In  1503-04  the  curriers  and 
cordwainers  were  prohibited  from  interfering  with  each  other's  trade.  Under 
Elizabeth  and  James  I,  the  limits  of  each  trade  were  marked  more  precisely  and  its 
technical  operations  minutely  regulated.  But  these  laws  were  found  so  irksome 
that  Elizabeth  empowered  a  favorite  by  letters  patent  to  grant  exemptions;  and 

in  1 61 6  the  London  Cordwainers  and  Curriers  after  much  litigation  had  come  to  a 
mutual  tacit  agreement  to  ignore  them."  Unwin:  Industrial  Organization,  pp.  21- 
22. 

'  Perhaps  the  journeymen  shoemakers  of  Philadelphia  were  exceptions.  Sec 
Commons  in  Q.  J.  E.,  November,  1909. 


28        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

prevent  the  capitalizing  of  it,  and  the  inevitable  accompanying 
attempt  at  concentration  of  alUed  or  supplementary  industries. 
From  advertisements  we  shall  show  tanners  and  curriers  and  shoe- 
makers on  friendly  terms  and  the  entrepreneurs  controlling  alike 
the  stock  and  work  of  them  all.  Correspondence  and  account 
books  will  show  merchants  seeing  to  it  that  enough  leather  was 
tanned  and  brought  to  market  to  ensure  proper  supplies  for  boot 
and  shoe  making  for  their  rapidly  increasing  export  possibihties. 
At  the  outset  of  the  Domestic  Stage  in  Massachusetts  (in  some 
towns  as  early  as  1760)  the  market  was  widening  and  the  possi- 
bilities of  profit  were  as  good  in  the  shoe  trade  as  in  other  ventures 
in  the  East  and  West  Indian  trade.  The  development  of  the 
retail  and  wholesale  trade  in  cities  Uke  Boston  and  Philadelphia 
tempted  capital.  There  were  already  more  shoemakers  than  could 
be  supported  by  custom  work  or  by  the  small  ventures  of  extra  sale 
work.  Both  the  workers  and  capital  were  ready  for  ventures  on 
a  larger  scale  for  both  the  domestic  and  foreign  markets.  Even 
if  foreign-made  shoes  were  being  imported,  the  Lynn  shoemakers 
were  undaunted.  They  studied  the  materials  and  the  make  of 
the  imported  shoes  while  newspaper  readers  studied  such  ad- 
vertisements as  the  following: 

Women's  brocaded  silk  shoes,  Women's  and  Children's  Calliminco  and 
Morocco  ditto,  Galoshes  ...  at  the  store  of  Wm.  Merchant  opposite  the 
Golden  Ball  on  the  Town  Dock,  Boston.  — Boston  Gazette,  April  23,  1754. 

Samuel  Abbot  has  imported  from  London  brocade,  russett  shoes,  plain 
shoes,  silk  cloggs,  soles  for  men's  shoes.  —  Boston  Gazette,  January  7,  1755. 

Influence  of  Foreign  Shoemaking  Standards 

Foreign  stock  and  styles  were  bought  and  duplicated  by  the 
Lynn  entrepreneurs.  They  used  the  imported  materials  for  up- 
pers and  findings.  Boston  merchants  ^  supplied  Lynn  shoemakers 
with  camblets,  everlasting,  calUmancoes,  awl-blades,  gimlets, 
fourteen  ounce  tacks,  shoe  nails  and  hammers. 

The  next  step  for  the  Lynn  shoemakers  was  to  depend  upon  an 
"imported  shoemaker"  to  teach  them  additional  niceties  of  the 

*  Amos  Breed's  account  books  show  him  to  be  a  large  consumer  for  all  such 
materials.     Cf.  Appendix  XI. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  29 

craft.  John  Adam  Dagyr,  a  Welshman,  came  to  Lynn  in  1750 
and  "gave  great  impulse  and  notoriety  to  the  business  by  pro- 
ducing shoes  equal  to  the  best  made  in  England."  ^  Whether  he 
came  on  his  own  account  or  was  invited  or  even  hired  to  come  by 
some  entrepreneur  shoemaker,  is  not  known.  His  coming  at  just 
the  right  moment  may  have  been,  and  probably  was,  only  a  very 
fortunate  coincidence  in  the  history  of  Lynn  shoemaking.  Ten 
years  after  the  Boston  Gazette  advertised  those  competing  English 
shoes  in  1754,  it  printed  in  its  issue  of  October  21,  1764,  the 
information : 

it  is  certain  that  women's  shoes  made  at  Lynn  do  now  exceed  those  usu- 
ally imported,  in  strength  aud  beauty  but  not  in  price.  Surely  then  it  is 
expected  that  the  public  spirited  ladies  of  the  town  and  province  will  turn 
their  immediate  attention  to  this  branch  of  manufacture. 

Influence  of  Revolutionary  and  Patriotic  Spirit  on  the  Shoe 

Industry 

Even  then,  the  advertiser  made  use  of  the  spirit  and  temper  of 
the  times.  Non-importation  sentiment  was  gaining  force,  people 
were  to  be  provided  with  chances  to  prove  their  avowals  of  belief 
in  patronizing  home  manufactures.  Evidently  patriotism  plus 
shipping  conditions  made  the  proper  response  come  in  the  next 
twenty  years.  In  the  single  year  of  1768,  there  were  8o,oc»o  pairs 
of  shoes  made  in  Lynn  according  to  the  statement  which  appeared 
in  the  Palladium  for  February  6,  1827. 

Newspapers  as  a  Source  of  Information  on  the  Shoe  Industry 

A  study  of  the  newspaper  advertisements,^  of  account  books 
and  of  private  correspondence  from  about  1750  to  18 10  makes  a 
definite  addition  to  the  information  obtainable  concerning  the 
rising  wholesale  and  retail  trade  in  boots  and  shoes,  the  prices, 
and  the  volume  of  business.' 

'  Alonzo  Lewis  in  his  History  of  Lynn,  published  1844,  p.  91,  makes  the  claim, 
quoted  above,  basing  it  upon  traditions  and  earlier  printed  accounts. 

*  See  Appendix  XII  and  XIII  for  samples  of  such  advertisements. 

'  The  London  archives  hold  records  for  1771  showing  the  shipment  of  5938  pairs 
from  North  America  to  the  British  and  forcifin  West  Indies.  Of  these,  1500  pairs  of 
shoes  were  from  Philadelphia.   The  bulk  of  the  shipment  probably  came  from  the 


30        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Importations  of  Foreign  Shoes  and  Public  Vendues  of 

Sale  Shoes 

Some  of  the  advertisements  ^  show  the  competition  from  foreign 
imported  shoes,  especially  women's  shoes,  which  had  to  be  met 
by  Lynn.  Others  show  conditions  in  Portsmouth  in  the  neighbor- 
ing state  of  New  Hampshire,  where  pubHc  vendues  of  shoes  were 
announced,  and  other  features  of  the  industry  as  organized  in 
Massachusetts  were  being  repeated.  Some  "stop  thief"  notices 
show  that  not  all  cobblers  were  honest. 

During  the  five  years  immediately  preceding  the  Revolution- 
ary War,  there  were  naturally  fewer  advertisements  of  English- 
made  shoes,  but  shoemakers'  supplies  of  goods  and  tools  were 
still  imported  and  advertised.  Once  in  January,  1771,  the  Massa- 
chusetts Spy  advertised  a  cargo  from  Leith,  which  included  one 
cask  of  shoes.  Here,  as  in  our  later  trade  with  the  West  Indies 
and  the  South,  the  watertight  container  was  in  constant  use  for 
packing  boots  and  shoes  as  well  as  other  commodities  for  export. 
In  the  same  paper,  under  date  of  March  11,  1773,  shoe  blacking 
appears  for  the  first  time  to  my  notice,  offered  as  "patent  cakes 
for  making  the  liquid,  shining,  blacking  for  shoes." 

Sole  Leather,  Imported  and  Domestic 

Boston  merchants  were  importing  dried  ox  hides  from  Jamaica 
by  February  21,  1774,  according  to  the  columns  of  the  Boston 
Gazette,  and  the  tanner's  business  was  thus  taking  on  competitors 
from  the  West  Indies  as  well  as  from  England.  By  1787,  the 
Salem  merchants  ^  were  importing  the  "best  of  salted  Hides 
lately  from  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  to  be  sold  at  the  store  of 
Elias  Hasket  Derby."  By  1795,^  they  were  importing  in  one  ship- 
ment 800  dried  hides  from  Curasao,  which  they  offered  for  sale 

other  shoe  centre,  Boston,  and  its  neighbors.  The  historical  account  of  shoemaking 
in  the  United  States  Census  of  1900  (Part  III,  vol.  ix,  p.  754)  says  that  in  1778, 
men's  shoes  were  made  in  Reading,  Braintree,  and  other  towns  of  the  Old  Colony 
for  the  wholesale  trade. 

^  See  Appendix  XII. 

*  Cf.  Salem  Mercury  of  May  15,  1787. 

'  Cf.  The  Salem  Gazette,  April  7,  1795,  and  November  24,  1795. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  3  I 

along  with  domestic  hides.  These  came  as  return  cargo  probably 
from  some  of  the  voyages  to  South  America. 

Sole  leather,  in  v/hole  sides  or  cut  up  into  "butt  soles,"  was 
frequently  mentioned  in  advertisements  of  imported  goods  from 
England  and  there  are  interesting  evidences  to  examine  in  other 
newspapers  of  the  supply  of  domestic  hides. ^ 

The  shoe  industry  in  central,  northern,  and  western  Massa- 
chusetts was  developing  the  Domestic  Stage  tardily  but  surely  in 
the  decade  following  the  Revolution,  taking  its  share  alongside 
Lynn  in  export  trade  before  the  century  was  over.  Notwith- 
standing the  attention  called  to  the  sale  of  imported  leather,  a 
large  percentage  of  the  leather  made  up  into  boots  and  shoes  all 
through  the  eighteenth  century  was  domestic.  The  village  tan- 
neries were  numerous,  busy  and  oftentimes  saleable.^ 

Barter  and  Financial  Conditions  in  the  Shoe  Trade 

The  lack  of  ready  money,  and  expected  difficulties  of  effect- 
ing future  purchases,  are  much  more  apparent  in  newspaper  ad- 
vertisements the  farther  the  place  is  from  Boston  and  the  coast 
trading  towns.  The  farmers  and  merchant  shoemakers  had 
pretty  nearly  barter  conditions  in  Hampshire  County .^ 

Some  farmers  used  the  flax  which  they  were  raising  to  meet  a 
demand  of  the  shoemakers  for  shoe  thread.  The  Hampshire  Gazette 
of  December  30,  1789,  printed  a  fairly  common  advertisement: 

Six  Pence  per  Pound,  Will  be  given  for  good  flax  for  which  pay  will  be 
made  in  Shoes,  Boots,  Indigo,  Tobacco,  etc. 

Here  again  is  evidence  that  even  a  matter  of  pence  in  payment 
was  subject  to  the  barter  system  in  western  Massachusetts  in 
the  troublesome  monetary  disturbances  of  the  years  after  the  Rev- 
olutionary War.  James  Byers  and  Co.  advertised  for  sale  at 
their  furnace  and  store  in  Springfield  on  December  3,  1788,  vari- 

'  An  issue  of  November  26,  1770  gives  the  first  advertisement  which  was  de- 
voted wholly  to  such  stock:  "Choice  Sole-leather.  Tanned  with  Hemlock  to  be 
sold  cheap  for  cash  by  the  Quantity  or  single  side.  By  Peter  Boyer  and  Co.  Mer- 
chants Row." 

'  See  Appendix  XIII. 

'  See  Appendix  XIII,  Case  of  Hezekiah  Hutchins. 


32        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

ous  tools  and  utensils  "for  which  Pearl  and  Potashes  .  .  .  Beef, 
Pork,  Woolen  and  Linen  Check,  Country  made  Hats  and  Shoes, 
Old  Pewter  and  West  India  Goods  will  be  received  in  pay- 
ment." 

Asa  White,  of  Williamsburgh,  in  June  1789,  informed  his 
"friends  and  customers"  that  he  had  "received  an  assortment  of 
English  and  West  India  goods"  which  he  was  now  "selling  on 
very  reasonable  terms  for  cash  and  many  kinds  of  Country  Prod- 
uce." He  also  wanted  "a  quantity  of  tow  cloth  and  Butter"  for 
which  he  would  pay  "any  of  the  above  mentioned  goods."  Rob- 
ert Breck,  of  Northampton,  on  September  30th  of  the  same  year, 
advertised  various  goods,  including  women's  shoes,  for  which  he 
would  take  home  products  of  farms  or  industries  in  return.^ 
Western  Massachusetts  was  still  a  farming  section  with  enough 
artisans  in  the  town  to  supply  local  customers  and  to  make  some 
sale  shoes  for  domestic  and  export  demands. 

Supply  of  Shoemakers 

Some  newspaper  notices  ^  give  interesting  suggestions  whence, 
geographically  and  socially,  the  shoemaking  class  was  recruited. 
We  shall  see  from  various  journals  and  account  books  that  the 
farmers'  sons  in  Massachusetts  frequently  became  apprentice 
lads,  belonging  to  the  same  class  and  town  as  their  master  shoe- 
maker. About  Philadelphia,  however,  there  seems  to  have  been 
a  steady  recruiting  of  cordwainers  from  the  colored  race  as  well 
as  from  Germans  and  Englishmen  who  came  to  this  country  al- 
ready acquainted  with  the  craft.  At  Litchfield,  Connecticut,  in 
the  same  year  (1755),  the  Monitor  advertised  as  follows: 

Wanted  as  apprentice  to  the  shoemaking  and  tanning  business,  a  lad 
about  14  or  15  years  old  that  can  come  well  recommended.    John  Hardy. 

This  is  particularly  interesting,  for  it  is  very  rarely  that  one 
finds  in  the  newspaper  files  of  Massachusetts  for  the  last  half  of 

'  These  advertisements  seem  further  evidence  that  many  farming  sections  had 
passed  out  of  the  Household  Stage  of  producing  shoes  for  their  own  consumption  by 
1789. 

^  See  Appendix  XII. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  3  3 

the  eighteenth  century  any  advertisements  for  either  apprentices 
or  journeymen,  while  in  the  Philadelphia  '  papers  for  the  same 
time  they  are  common. 

Wholesale  and  Retail  Trade 

Newspaper  advertisements  tell  us  also  of  the  fact  that  the 
local  country  dealers  claimed  as  low  prices  as  could  be  secured 
in  cities.  John  Mansfield  in  the  Worcester  Gazette,  of  March  6, 
1798,  offered 

a  good  assortment  of  shoes,  consisting  of  fancy  shoes,  black  Florentine, 
misses  and  children's  shoes,  all  which  are  made  and  warranted  at  his  shop, 
opposite  the  Bridge  and  Wheeler's  store.  Good  allowance  made  to  those 
that  purchase  by  quantity  and  as  cheap  by  retail  as  they  are  in  Boston.  He 
has  also  for  sale  Florentines,  Morocco  skins,  Bindings  and  Bobbins. 

Up  in  Portland,  Maine,  in  the  July  20,  1795  issue  of  the  East- 
ern Herald  warranted  shoes  of  all  kinds  are  offered  for,  "Ladies, 
Gentlemen,  and  Children:  also  Ladies'  Sandals  and  Misses'  red 
and  black  Morocco  Slippers  manufactured  particularly  for  Wait 
and  Gedege  and  sold  wholesale  and  retail  at  their  bookstore  ^  in 
Portland."  "Shopkeepers  in  town  and  country  may  be  supplied 
as  cheap  as  they  can  purchase  in  Boston." 

*  Pennsylvania  Gazette  for  January  24,  1771.  "Apprentice  to  be  sold  at  a  Rea- 
sonable Price.  The  time  of  an  apprentice  lad  who  is  bound  to  learn  the  Shoe- 
maker's Trade;  he  has  yet  7  years  and  10  months  to  serve,  is  a  smart  likely  Boy 
and  is  sold  for  no  fault.  Any  Master  Shoemaker  who  wants  such  a  one,  may  know 
the  particulars  by  enquiring.  He  is  living  in  Germantown  on  Mr.  Wistar's  place. 
Peter  Fritsly."  Whether  this  apprentice  lad  was  colored  or  not  cannot  be  told  by 
the  text.  There  is  no  reason  to  think  so  except  in  the  line  where  it  said  "to  be  sold" 
and  probably  here  only  his  time,  indentured  time,  is  meant.  Another  advertise- 
ment of  February  21,  1771,  dated  at  Lancaster,  Pennsylvania,  reads:  —  "Com- 
mitted to  my  custody,  September  25,  1770,  a  certain  James  Hogan  23  years 
of  age  5  ft.  9  inches  high,  a  shoemaker  by  trade;  he  says  he  belongs  to  Richard 
Long  in  Anne  .\rundel  County  and  province  of  Maryland.  His  said  master 
is  required  to  come  in  3  weeks  and  pay  charges  or  he  will  be  sold  out  for  the  same. 
G.  E.,  gaoler." 

*  It  may  seem  odd  to  find  shoes  offered  for  sale  at  a  bookstore,  but  advertise- 
ments show  that  tanners  used  to  sell  supplies  of  leather  to  bookbinders  and  it  was 
not  a  far  cry  to  cordwainers  using  a  bookbinder's  book  store  for  the  display  of  their 
extra  sale  shoes,  nor  for  such  a  bookseller  to  become  an  entrepreneur  in  a  shoe 
trade  in  the  early  days  of  the  Domestic  System  when  the  venture  was  simply  a 
"side-show"  to  his  main  business. 


34        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Shoes  for  Export  to  the  South  and  to  the  West  Indies 

Manufacture,  in  other  places  than  Lynn,  for  export  trade 
makes  itself  evident  through  newspaper  columns  at  the  close  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  John  Mansfield,  advertising  in  the 
Worcester  Gazette  for  March  6,  1799,  perhaps  suggested  wholesale 
trade  for  export  when  he  stated  that  he  had  for  sale 

a  quantity  of  excellent  Red  Morocco  skins,  Ladies'  Morocco  Shoes  from  5/8 
to  85  per  pair,  —  Ladies'  Florentine  do.  from  3/8  to  6s.  Misses  and  Chil- 
dren's Shoes  of  all  sizes. 

Hezekiah  Beardslee  and  Co.  announced  in  the  Middlesex  Ga- 
zette of  February  7,  1795,  that 

The  subscribers  want  to  get  made  a  quantity  of  shoes  of  all  kinds  for 
exportation  for  which  good  pay  will  be  made.  Likewise,  wanted,  good 
journeymen  at  the  Men's  or  Women's  Branch,  none  but  good  workmen  need 
apply  —  all  such  will  receive  good  wages  at  the  shoe  Manufactory  in  Middle- 
town.^ 

On  June  27th  of  the  same  year,  this  firm  advertises  for  stock. 

Wanted  at  the  shoe  manufactory  in  Middletown,  Tanned  Calf-skins  for 
which  cash  will  be  given.  Likewise  we  give  9  pence  per  pound  for  green 
calf-skin. 

Salem  was  even  then  devoting  herself  to  shipping  rather  than 
manufacturing,^  building  up  a  coastwise  as  well  as  an  Eastern 
trade.   She  was  oiBfering '  chances  of  coastwise  transportation 

For  Norfolk  and  Baltimore.  The  Schooner,  Industry,  Richard  Smith, 
Master,  will  sail  in  12  days.  For  freight  or  passage  apply  to  master  on  board 
at  Union  Wharf. 

By  studying  the  newspapers  of  the  South  for  the  years  1780  to 
1 810,  one  gets  a  realization  of  the  extent  and  method  of  the 

1  Middletown,  in  Essex  County,  was  20  miles  north  of  Boston. 

*  There  was  some  manufacture  of  shoes  there,  however,  or  in  outlying  towns, 
or  else  an  entrepreneur  bought  up  stock  from  a  distance,  for  Abner  Chase  adver- 
tised on  December  29,  1794,  at  Salem:  —  "Abner  Chase  has  for  sale,  by  wholesale 
or  retail,  at  his  shoe-store  in  Essex  Street,  in  addition  to  his  former  assortment,  a 
variety  of  thick  and  thin  men's  shoes,  suitable  for  the  West  India  or  Southern 
Market.  He  has  also  for  sale  by  the  piece,  a  good  assortment  of  Florentine  and 
Sattinetts,  cheap  for  cash." 

Salem  was  then  a  depot  for  imported  materials  as  stock  for  shoes  as  well  as 
for  manufactured  exports. 

'  Cf.  Salem  Gazette  of  January  13,  1795- 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  35 

wholesale  shoe  trade  for  export  from  New  England.  In  the 
Charleston  Gazette,'^  the  issue  of  July  3,  1783,  William  Hort  and 
Co.  advertised  that  they  had  entered  the  commission  business, 
wanted  foreign  cargoes  and  country  produce,  having  their  count- 
ing house  on  Eliot  Street  and  the  Bay.  They  had  just  received 
for  sale  on  commission,  in  the  brigantine  St.  Peter,  from  Am- 
sterdam, "textiles,  clothing,  hats,  men's,  women's  and  children's 
shoes,  slippers,  wines,  cordage,  and  paint." 

By  the  South  Carolina  Gazette  of  November  i,  1784,  Patrick 
Hinds  advertised  to  inform  factors  ^  of  Charleston  that  they 
might  be  supplied,  on  their  own  accounts  with  any  quantity  of 
Negro  shoes  and  boots  for  their  country  customers,  —  credit 
until  January  next.  Again  at  Charleston  in  the  City  Gazette  of 
May  2,  1790,  there  was  published  this  notice,  — 

Just  arrived,  by  Captain  Carman  from  Philadelphia;  and  for  sale  at  Har- 
rison's boot  and  shoe  manufactory  No.  25  Broad  Street,  a  large  and  general 
assortment  of  shoes  and  boots  made  at  their  manufactory  in  Philadelphia. 
...  J.  and  T.  Harrison  take  this  method  of  returning  their  sincere  thanks 
to  the  public  in  general  and  their  customers  in  particular  for  their  generous 
encouragement. 

Seven  months  later,  John  Harrison  advertised: 

Just  received  from  the  Northward  ...  a  few  hundred  pairs  of  men's 
shoes  and  boots  and  women's  stuff  shoes  made  by  the  best  workmen  in  Dub- 
lin. A  quantity  of  brown  negro  shoes  at  3^.  ^d.  per  pair  and  black  at  45.  and 
45  and  M.  Gentlemen  who  give  preference  to  their  shoes  and  boots  being 
made  in  Philadelphia,  their  measure  will  be  taken  and  attended  to.  Also, 
received  from  his  manufactory  in  Rhode  Island  a  quantity  of  Men's,  Youths 
and  Children's  fine  and  coarse  shoes.  He  has  on  hand  to  dispose  of  very  low, 
a  number  of  shoes  that  came  from  Elizabeth  Town. 

These  same  Charleston  shoe  merchants,  not  content  with  their 
allied  manufactory  in  Philadelphia,  had  established  one  in  Rhode 
Island.^    The  advertisement  in  the  Charleston,  S.  C,  City  Gazette 

'  Charleston,  S.  C,  had  a  population  of  16,000  in  1790. 

*  These  factors  were  general  store  merchants  who  supplied  plantation  owners 
with  everything  they  needed  to  buy,  from  needles  and  shoes  to  coffins,  and  took 
the  planters'  crops  of  rice  and  indigo  in  return. 

'  I  have  not  been  able  to  find  any  clue  to  the  location  of  this  factor>-,  though 
probably  it  was  in  the  northwestern  corner  near  the  Worcester  region  of  Massa- 
chusetts. The  shoe  business  was  rarely  found  in  Rhode  Island  developed  beyond 
the  custom  stage  with  some  extra  sale  work.    When  it  came  to  a  consideration  of 


36        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

for  July  7,  1 791,  practically  repeated  previous  advertisements  of 
the  Harrison  firm  and  added, 

John  Harrison  having  established  a  manufactory  in  Rhode  Island  ^  for  the 
purpose  of  having  general  assortment  of  low  priced  shoes,  informs  the  public 
that  he  has  received  from  the  above  place  some  hundreds  of  men  and  chil- 
dren's common  shoes,  which  he  will  sell  at  a  reduced  price. 


Private  Correspondence  of  Shoe  Merchants 

With  this  information  from  the  newspapers  of  the  last  half  of 
the  eighteenth  century  to  give  a  conception  of  the  volume  and 
markets  of  the  shoe  industry  for  both  domestic  and  export  trade, 
one  can  turn  for  intimate  detail  to  the  private  correspondence 
and  account  books  of  shoemakers  and  merchants. 

Captain  Thomas  Willson,  writing  to  Mr.  Thomas  Allen,  mer- 
chant at  New  London,^  on  January  14,  1773  from  St.  Croix,  said: 

Dear  Friend:  This  is  to  advise  you  that  I  have  just  finisht  the  sale  of  my 
Cargo  am  abt.  to  Sel  my  Vessel  if  I  can.  I  have  clear'd  on  my  Cargo  and 
Fret  £601  ''4  ''4  besides  about  49p'"  mens  Shoes  yet  to  sell  a  few  oats  which 
is  not  so  bad  for  i  mo  Sarvis.  .  .  . 

From  the  correspondence  of  Nicholas  Brown  and  Co.  of  Provi- 
dence, R.  L,  under  date  of  ist  month,  4th,  1773,  there  comes  a 
letter  from  Lynn,  Mass.,  from  Silvanus  Hussey,  asking  Nicholas 
Brown  and  Co.  "to  deliver  in  Lynn  or  Boston  100  lbs.  tea  for 
100  prs.  women's  shoes."  ^ 

On  October  10,  1789,  Sir  John  Temple,  bart.,  H.  B.  M.  consul 

putting  capital  into  shoemaking  for  export  trade,  entrepreneurs  in  Rhode  Island 
found  that  they  could  do  better  to  engage  in  shipping  to  the  West  Indies  as  well  as 
to  the  Far  East;  in  iron  and  cordage  making,  and  ship  building.  This  was  true  at 
Providence,  Newport,  Warren,  and  Bristol. 

*  This  may  simply  mean  the  entrepreneur  relations  of  Harrison  with  scattered 
domestic  shoemakers  in  Rhode  Island.  Cf.  the  expression  "Hamburg  embroideries" 
made  in  Switzerland  but  shipped  from  Hamburg;  or  "Leghorn  hats"  from  Tuscany. 

^  See  letter  in  MS.  in  the  Allen  papers  at  the  American  Antiquarian  Society,  at 
Worcester,  Mass. 

*  Mr.  Wm.  B.  Weeden,  author  of  the  Economic  History  of  New  England,  in 
transmitting  this  letter  to  me  added  —  "  tea  not  specified  but  without  doubt  it 
was  Bohea.  .  .  .  This  letter  indicates  that  manufacturing  for  trade  was  then 
underway.   Hussey  was  a  trader  probably." 


DOMRSTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  37 

at  New  York  City,  wrote  thence  to  the  Duke  of  Leeds,  Secretary 
of  State  for  Foreign  affairs,  as  follows:  ^ 

In  my  last  I  might  have  said  much  more  upon  the  Progress  of  various 
manufactures  in  these  States.  All  kinds  of  Cabinet  Work,  carriages,  Sadlery, 
Men's  and  Women's  Shoes,  etc.  are  so  made  here  as  that  the  duties^  laid 
upon  such  articles  from  Europe  will  put  an  End  to  any  Importation  of  them. 

While  in  most  cases  the  reasons  for  non-shoemakers  becoming 
entrepreneurs  in  the  shoe  manufacture  and  trade  have  been  left 
to  surmise,  certain  letters  and  business  papers  of  John  Wendell, 
of  Portsmouth,  New  Hampshire,  tell  a  story  which  might  be 
supposed  to  be  typical  of  an  entrepreneur  who  was  pushed,  so  to 
speak,  into  the  shoe  business  as  an  outcome  of  other  financial 
cares  and  responsibilities '  in  settling  the  estate  of  a  debtor. 

Account  hooks  kept  in  Pioneer  Days  of  the  Domestic  System  in 

the  Shoe  Industry 

The  small  beginnings  in  the  pioneering  days  are  disclosed  in 
such  accounts  as  those  Amos  Breed  of  Lynn  kept  from  1763  to 
1790.  In  those  first  years  even,  much  of  Breed's  work  was  under 
the  Domestic  Stage  of  the  shoe  industry. 

Cimbil  to  Amos  Breed,  Dr. 

1763  £  s.  d. 

May    7     To  make  20  pairs  of  Callimanco  shoes 26  o  o 

May  23      "        "       I      "     "         "                "     I  60 

June  II       "        "       2      "      "          "                "     2  12  o 

June  25      "        "       5      "      "          "                "     6  10  o 

July  16      "        "       8      "      "          "                "     10  8  o 

Aug.  16      "        "       5      "      "          "                "     6  10  o 

Brigham  to  Amos  Breed,  Dr. 

1764  £  s.    d. 

Nov.    2    To  make  21  pairs  of  Calla  shoes 3  17     6 

Nov.  17      "        "     10      "      "       "         "     I  16     8 

Nov.  28      "        "       I      "      "       "         "     o  38 

Dec.     8      "        "       5      "      "       "         "     0184 

Dec.  21      "        "       8      "     "       "         "     I  94 

^  This  letter  is  in  the  volume  called  B.  T.  6/21  {i.e.,  the  21st  volume  of  the  Mis- 
cellanea of  the  Board  of  Trade)  at  the  Public  Record  Office,  London. 

*  Cf.  United  States  Tariff  on  boots  and  shoes  quoted  on  p.  40. 

*  See  Appendix  XV  for  Wendell  letters,  especially  one  of  December  23,  1802. 


38   ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

These  men,  Cimbil  and  Brigham,  are  hired  to  make  the  shoes. 
Amos  Breed  is  evidently  supplying  the  stock.  He  is  also  keep- 
ing a  sort  of  custom-retail  trade  at  his  home  in  Lynn. 

Nathaniel  Homes  to  Amos  Breed,  Dr. 

1766  £      s.    d. 

Mar.    8    To  I  pair  of  Call,  shoes  for  Poeb 2     30    o 

Apr.  19      "    I     "    everlasting  shoes  for  Hamiah 2     40    o 

Apr.  19      "    I     "    leather  shoes  for  Lydia 160 

July  12      «    I     «    silk  "       "  self 2      8    o 

July  19      "    I     "    russet       "      "  Poeb 2    60    o 

The  same  account  with  Nathaniel  Homes  continues  for  the 
years  1766-71,  with  the  entry  of  52  pairs  of  shoes  in  all.  Never 
more  than  3  pairs  were  charged  at  a  time,  and  generally  each 
pair  was  for  a  specified  person  in  the  family.  All  this  was  custom 
work,  calhng  for  better  stock,  greater  care  and  skill  than  Breed 
and  his  journeymen  were  putting  into  the  shoes  mentioned  above 
for  export. 

Breed  was  doing  custom  work  for  Nathaniel  Heath,  also  in 

1767-69  for  he  records  him  as  debtor: 

£  s.  d. 

Oct.  30    To  2  pair  of  shoes,  i  call.,  i  leather 3  10  o 

Nov.  14      «    2     "     "       "      leather 2  14  o 

Dec.  19      "I     "     "       "          "       I  10  o 

1768 

Jan.  7  «  J  «  «  Galoshes i  15  o 

Jan.  23  «  J  «  «  calla  Galoshes  ^ 2  o  o 

Feb.  10  "  2  "  "  leather  Galoshes 2  16  o 

Breed  not  only  hired  shoes  made  and  sold  them  for  both  do- 
mestic and  foreign  trade,  but  he  mended  them. 

Account  of  Richard  Breed  to  Amos  Breed 

1768  £    s.  d. 

Jan.   23    To  mending  i  pair  of  shoes 15  o 

June  17      "   making    i      "    «       "for  wife 2      o  o 

June  18      "   mending  I      «    «       «       «   self 12  o 

Dec.  15      "   making    i      "    "       "      2      o  o 

Feb.  21      "         "        I  Deer  Skin 7     18  o 

^  Calimanco  shoes  almost  always  billed  as  £2  in  custom  accounts. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  39 

Meanwhile,  Amos  Breed  was  charging  the  following  items  ^  to 
Samuel  Breed,  who  evidently  bought  things  from  Amos  Breed's 
general  store  in  Lynn : 

1768 

July  12    To  I  pr.  of  stuff  for  self i  7  o 

"i«     «      "    9  o 

"    tools,  pinchers  and  Nipers 1  o  o 

"    2  pr.  of  heel  taps o  2  o 

Aug.            "    I    "     "  Everlasting  Stuff i  40 

Sept.    3      «    I    «     "  leather o  15  o 

Sept.  17      "    I    "     "  Everlasting  Stuff i  4  o 

Sept.  23      "   cash  paid  25  shUlins i  5  o 

Oct.   13      "    I  doz.  of  Buttens 3  o 

Nov.    5      "    I  pr.  of  Silver  Buckels 5  i  o 

Nov.    5      «    I    «    "  stuffs  for  Gurl o  9  o 

This  account  runs  thus  to  1775.  In  1783,  October  20th,  it  is 
renewed  and  settled.  "The  balance  due  to  me'(Amos  Breed)  old 
Tenor  3-15-11  Samuel  Breed.    He  paid  then  in  full." 

These  accounts  ^  have  been  given  here  because  they  are  typical 
in  regard  to  custom  work,  sale  work  for  both  domestic  and  foreign 
trade,  dealings  with  customers  and  journeymen.  To  summarize 
then,  briefly,  what  these  newspaper  advertisements,  public  and 
private  correspondence  and  account  books  tell  us,  the  demand  for 
Lynn  shoes  and  the  competition  which  makers  of  women's  shoes 
in  Massachusetts  had  to  meet  from  imported  goods  had  made 
itself  felt  by  1760.  The  Lynn  entrepreneurs '  were  specializing  in 
women's  and  children's  shoes  and  leaving  the  making  of  men's 
boots  and  shoes  almost  wholly  to  custom  work  or  to  cruder  local 
work.  Few  if  any  advertisements  of  men's  shoes  appear  before 
the  Revolution. 

Tariff  Legislation  of  lySg 

During  the  years  of  the  Revolutionary  War,  however,  the 
supply  of  shoes  for  the  Continental  army  had  to  be  undertaken, 
and  all  the  stock  raised  and  tanned  in  this  country.  Accounts 
show  that  organization  had  developed  in  the  shoe  industry  to 

'  These  are  selected  from  many  others. 

*  Several  others  from  the  Breed  papers  are  given  in  Appendix  XT. 

»  Cf.  U.  S.  Census  of  i860,  p.  Ixix. 


40        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

meet  these  conditions  by  the  close  of  the  war.  Southern  and  west- 
ern Massachusetts  had  come  to  specialize  in  men's  shoes,  bro- 
gans  and  high  boots,  while  Lynn  kept  to  her  older  specialty  of 
women's  and  children's.  That  the  boot  and  shoe  business  was 
considered  profitable  to  capitalists  and  important  to  the  people 
at  large  is  indicated  by  the  Federal  tariff  legislation  of  1789,^ 
which  gave  protection  to  this  industry.  The  tradition  seems  as 
well  founded  as  it  is  detailed  that  this  action  was  due  to  the  shoe 
merchants  of  Massachusetts^  as  well  as  to  those  of  Pennsylvania. 
Their  pressure  was  strong  enough,  joined  to  the  general  current 
towards  protection,  to  override  the  specific  illustration  of  James 
Madison  in  a  discussion  April  9,  1789,  against  protecting  shoes.' 

Summary  of  Development  in  First  Phase  of  Domestic  Period 

The  wording  of  advertisements  all  through  the  years  1760  to 
1810  shows  us  a  transition  period.  Then  there  were  existing  side 
by  side  both  the  first  phase  of  the  Domestic  Stage,  where  the 
entrepreneur  was  a  capitalist  shoemaker,  hiring  workers  in  their 
homes  to  make  boots  and  shoes  for  him  to  sell  at  retail  or  whole- 
sale, and  the  last  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Stage  of  the  shoe  in- 
dustry, where  the  custom  makers  in  the  village  put  some  extra 
or  sale  work  into  their  local  store  to  help  pay  their  grocery  bills. 

^  Tariff  rates  of  July  4,  1789: 

On  boots  per  pair,  50  cents. 

On  shoes,  slippers  or  galoshes  made  of  leather  per  pair,  7  cents. 

On  shoes  or  slippers  made  of  silk  or  stuff,  10  cents  per  pair.  Tariff  of  August  10, 
1790:  provisions  of  previous  tariff  kept  and  one  added  which  put  on  leather  tanned 
or  tawed,  and  on  manufactures  of  which  leather  was  the  chief  article,  the  7I  per  cent 
ad  valorem  duty  that  was  put  on  other  raw  products. 

"  Bryant's  naive  account  of  this  legislation  influenced  by  President  George 
Washington's  favorable  impression  of  the  city  is  open  to  question.  Cf.  pp.  6-7  of 
Shoe  and  Leather  Trade,  etc. 

'  "  .  .  .  For  example,  we  should  find  no  advantage  in  saying  that  every  man 
should  be  obliged  to  furnish  himself  by  his  own  labor  with  those  accommodations 
which  depend  upon  the  mechanic's  art,  instead  of  employing  his  neighbor,  who 
could  do  it  for  him  on  better  terms.  It  would  be  no  advantage  for  a  shoemaker  to 
make  his  own  clothes  in  order  to  save  the  expense  of  the  tailor's  bill,  nor  of  the  tailor 
to  make  his  own  shoes  to  save  the  expense  of  procuring  them  from  the  shoemaker. 
.  .  .  The  same  argument  holds  good  between  nation  and  nation."  Cf.  Annals  of 
Congress,  I  Cong.  1834,  I,  pp.  109-148. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  41 

This  picture  based  on  printed  contemporary  evidence  is  a  true 
one  of  any  community  where  the  close  of  one  phase  of  an  indus- 
trial organization  runs  parallel  with  the  opening  of  a  new  phase. 
In  Massachusetts  the  Domestic  System  was  well  established  in  its 
first  phase  for  the  capitaHst-merchant  had  appeared  to  venture, 
to  lose  or  to  profit  in  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  in  some  com- 
munities by  1760,  in  many  by  1810.  The  impulse  (i)  of  the  sales 
during  the  Revolutionary  War,  (2)  of  the  demands  of  trade  in  the 
United  States  after  it,  and  (3)  of  the  tariff,  gave  a  big  stimulus. 
The  growth  of  the  market  for  boots  and  shoes  and  its  assured 
protection  did  not  fail  to  widen  the  ranks  of  capitalists  and  to 
intensify  the  manner  of  production.  A  new  phase,  outwardly 
marked  by  prosperity  and  volume,  prevailed  in  Massachusetts 
from  about  1810  to  1837. 


CHAPTER  III 

DOMESTIC  STAGE.    PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM,  1760-1855 

Phase  2,  1810-1837 

Specialization  in  processes  and  the  rise  of  the  Central  Shop  are  the  chief 
characteristics. 

Introduction  and  definition  of  Phase  2,  "ten-footers, "cabbage  stock  and  waste; 
the  central  shop  and  its  function;  proportion  of  domestic  workers;  phraseology 
changes  to  keep  in  touch  with  new  organization;  Ebenezer  Belcher's  account  book 
shows  prices  and  volume  of  output;  Lincoln's  store  and  trade  in  shoes. 

Central  Shops  and  entrepreneurs.  Lincoln  was  an  entrepreneur  on  a  larger 
scale;  other  investments  of  shoe  entrepreneurs;  the  Littlefields  with  the  southern 
markets  and  the  post  oflBce;  domestic  workers  and  the  central  shop  relations; 
Natick's  beginnings;  Felches  and  Walcotts;  Brookfield  slow  in  developing  domestic 
stage  of  shoe  industry;  general  conditions  portrayed  in  general  store  account  books 
of  Skinner  and  Ward;  F.  and  E.  Batcheller  manufactured  russet  brogans  for  South- 
ern trade,  and  built  up  big  prosperous  business  from  1825  to  1835;  general  prosper- 
ous conditions  in  the  shoe  towns  in  Massachusetts  in  1837.  Panic  and  hard  times 
in  shoe  towns,  as  well  as  elsewhere,  1837-39. 

Specialization  in  Processes 

The  new  phase,  which  prevailed  from  about  18 10  to  the  panic 
year  of  1837,  was  characterized  by  specialization  in  processes  and 
the  rise  of  the  central  shop.  The  extra  capital  which  was  tempted 
into  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  brought  more  competition  for 
orders,  and  suggested  a  speciaUzation  to  secure  rapid  work 
which  may  be  taken  as  the  chief  characteristic  of  the  second 
phase  of  the  Domestic  Stage.  The  time  factor  seemed  more  vital 
than  the  quahty,  for  with  such  big,  insistent  markets,  a  merchant 
could  afford  to  lose  a  disgruntled  customer  occasionally,  sure  of 
having  plenty  of  others.  Already  the  producer  did  not  have  to  face 
the  customer.  His  reputation  did  not  suffer  from  occasional  bad 
v/  work.  The  standards  were  therefore  lowered,  and  the  competition 
of  the  employers  gave  entrance  into  the  trade  to  less  skilled  and 
almost  unskilled  labor  to  do  the  cheaper  work  on  men's  brogans 
and  women's  and  children's  shoes  for  the  well  developed  trade  in 
the  West  Indies  and  the  South.  A  wide  difference  arose  not  only 

42 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  43 

between  the  quality  of  custom  and  of  domestic  work,  but  between 
the  wages  of  "real  journeymen"  and  of  shoemakers. 

Waste  in  the  Ten-Footers 

As  the  workers  grew  more  numerous  in  the  employ  of  each 
Massachusetts  capitalist  and  were  scattered  in  their  shops,  called 
"ten-footers,"'  over  a  wider  area,  in  fact  all  through  New  Eng- 
land from  Portland,  Maine,  to  the  Island  of  Nantucket,  the  need 
of  inspection  of  the  finished  product,  as  well  as  of  saving  by  the 
cutting  of  stock  at  the  central  shops  became  vitally  necessary. 
Previously  the  stock  for  both  uppers  and  soles  had  been  given 
out  in  skins  and  sides,  leaving  it  to  the  shoemaker  to  cut  wisely 
and  economically.  What  he  could  save  by  honest  or  dishonest 
means  he  felt  free  to  keep  in  his  "cabbage"  stock  box  under  his 
low  shoemaker's  bench.  Old  shoemakers  are  found  now  in  every 
locality  who  recall  with  bitterness  certain  individuals  whose  dis- 
honesty and  poor  work  led  to  the  development  of  the  central 
shop.  They  blame  the  open  way  in  which  scrap  leather  buyers 
went  about  on  regular  routes  to  buy  up  the  accumulated  "cab- 
bage" stock  which  meant  loss  to  the  capitalist  while  it  was  a 
source  of  profit  to  the  shoemaker  and  presumably  to  the  scrap- 
man.  These  old  people  make  the  complaint  with  little  realiza- 
tion that  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  has  simply  followed  the 
example  of  the  silk  and  the  woolen  industry  in  experiencing,  in 
the  course  of  growth,  the  need  of  sa\'ing  stock  as  well  as  time,  and 
of  giving  to  agents  the  power  of  inspection  formerly  exercised  by 

*  Johnson  in  his  Sketches  of  Lynn,  pp.  23-24,  describes  the  ten-footers  in  detail. 
They  came  into  use  about  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Their  size  varied 
from  10  X  10  feet  to  14  x  14  feet.  The  average  size,  however,  was  nearer  12x12 
and  6J  clear  in  height.  The  garret,  called  a  cockloft,  was  left  unfinished  and  was 
the  common  receptacle  of  litter  and  everything  not  wanted  for  present  use  or 
wanted  only  occasionally.  This  garret  was  reached  by  a  perpendicular  ladder  and 
was  seldom  cleared  out.  The  number  of  benches  varied  from  four  to  eight,  accord- 
ing to  the  size  of  the  ten-footer,  each  bench  being  placed  far  enough  from  the  wall 
or  the  next  bench  to  allow  the  arms  to  be  swung  out  as  the  shoemaker  sewed  with 
full  length  thread.  Such  a  space  was  called  a  berth,  and  the  group  of  men  who 
worked  there  was  called  the  shop's  crew.  These  last  names  are  interesting  as  local 
color  of  a  seaport,  for  in  other  shoe  centres  away  from  the  water  I  have  never  found 
either  crew  or  berth  used  in  connection  with  a  ten-footer. 


44        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

the  gild  officials  of  the  Middle  Ages,  or  by  the  master  shoemaker 
of  early  colonial  days. 

Rise  of  the  Central  Shop:  Its  Function 

The  Central  Shop  System  developed  rapidly  after  1820.  The 
stock  was  cut  there  and  portioned  out  ready  to  deliver  to  work- 
ers to  do  the  "fitting,"  i.  e.,  the  work  on  the  uppers,  siding  up  the 
seams,  binding,  and  counter  and  strap  stitching.  When  this 
process  was  completed,  the  uppers  were  returned  to  the  central 
shop  and  given  out  with  the  proper  number  of  roughly  cut  soles, 
as  well  as  a  definite  quantity  of  thread,  to  ''makers"  who  would 
last  and  then  sole  the  boots  and  shoes.  The  makers  had  to  wait 
generally  for  their  work  to  be  inspected  or  crowned  at  the  central 
shop  before  new  work  was  given  out.  The  volume  of  trade  and 
the  amount  of  specialization  can  be  understood  by  the  study  of  a 
single  month's  business  dealings  in  one  firm's  ledger,  for  1833.^ 

Changes  in  Organization  and  Phraseology 

The  transition  to  this  second  phase  from  the  first  under  the 
Domestic  System  was  of  course  as  gradual  and  almost  imper- 
ceptible to  the  shoemakers  and  shoe  merchants  themselves  as  it 
was  to  the  onlookers  then,  and  as  it  is  to  research  students  of 
today.  The  account  books  changed  their  phraseology  but  slowly 
to  keep  pace  with  actual  changes  in  business  organization.  Take, 
for  simple  illustration  the  word  "making"  as  applied  to  boots 
and  shoes.  Roughly  dated,  until  181 5  it  meant  making  the  whole 
boot.    After  that,  when  processes  were  subdivided  and  parcelled 

*  White  and  Whitcomb  of  East  Randolph  (now  Holbrook)  were  employing  in 

1833,  from  September  4th  to  October  4th,  twelve  men  and  women  to  do  fitting, 

thirty  men  to  make,  and  one  man  to  do  all  the  cutting,  pasting,  and  blacking.   Both 

the  styles  and  the  finish  were  crude,  and  the  usual  proportion  of  labor  was  one 

central  shop  worker  to  about  forty  domestic  workers.   The  larger  sales  during  that 

month  were  to  the  following  firms: 

No.  of  pairs 

J.  C.  Addington  and  Co. $226.18 

Porter  and  Tileston    

B.  C.  Harris 

C.  W.  Howes  and  Co 

C.  W.  Howes  and  Co 

N.  Houghton  and  Co 

Wm.  Tiffany   


205.64 

*3W 
212 

57-50 

SO 

25750 

250 

237-40 

262 

2X8 

100.00 

100 

.  ^ . 


/ 


7 


4 


.^ 


/^< 


y^/K^-C  f  ^'^^^ 


A 


^ 


^/y^^ 


^^6'/*^^^'^ 


/♦*«-^- 


>j'  < 


E»R\KZKI{  HKIXHKU-S  A((()l\r   HODK  SHOWS  PRICES  OF  SHOEMAKINU 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  45 

out  to  different  individuals,  the  word  came  to  have  a  technical  *- 
meaning,  and  was  meant  to  include  only  the  lasting  and  bottom- 
ing. Where  it  appears  frequently  in  one  and  the  same  account 
book,  in  one  and  the  same  handwriting,  it  is  often  hard  to  tell 
which  is  meant.  The  best  guide  so  far  has  been  to  note  the  ab- 
sence or  the  presence  of  other  words  designating  supplementary 
processes,  b'ke  siding  up,  and  crimping,  to  decide  when  making 
meant  only  putting  on  the  soles. 

To  show  this  transition  not  only  in  wording  but  also  in  indus- 
trial organization,  certain  accounts  of  individuals  who  manu- 
factured boots  and  shoes  both  before  and  after  18 10  have  been 
reserved  for  consideration  here,  as  the  major  part  of  their  work 
was  done  in  the  second  phase  of  this  Domestic  Stage. 

Account  Books  Show  Prices  and  Volume  of  Output 

In  an  old  ledger  of  a  shoemaker-farmer  of  South  Randolph, ^ 
beginning  with  1807,  the  entries  are  continuous  for  about  40 
years.  They  tell  of  the  work  ^  done  in  a  "  ten-footer  "  by  Ebenezcr 
Belcher  with  his  regular  apprentices  and  journeymen.  The 
pages  of  the  same  account  book  tell  of  his  simultaneous  working 
of  his  farm  with  the  aid  of  his  sons.  The  development  of  the  shoe- 
making  industry  in  Randolph  already  has  been  traced '  through 
the  extra  sale  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Period  into  the  first  phase 
of  the  Domestic  System,  when  the  entrepreneurs  appeared  to 
organize  the  shoe  industry  among  the  Randolph  shoemakers  in 
order  to  meet  the  probable  demands  of  the  export  trade.  Silas 
Alden,  Moses  and  Thomas  French  had  been  pioneers  in  it.  By 
1810,  there  seem  to  have  been  several  merchant  employers  in  the 
vicinity  who  were  allies  or  competitors  of  Silas  Alden.  Three 
entrepreneurs,  Isaac  Thayer  of  West  Randolph;  John  Arnold  *  of 

'  A  settlement  now  known  officially  as  Brookville,  Mass. 

*  This  account  book  was  given  to  Harvard  University  in  1908  by  his  dauRhter- 
in-law,  and  can  be  studied  there.  A  picture  of  this  same  "ten-footer"  and  of  Eben- 
ezer  Belcher's  house  is  attached  to  the  fly  leaf. 

'  Cf.  pp.  18,  19. 

*  John  Arnold  was  a  farmer  who  ran  a  cider  mill  and  sold  shoes.  He  had  no 
central  shop  or  store,  but  he  took  the  shoes  to  Boston  in  saddle  bags  as  Quincy 
Reed  did.  Later  he  employed  Amasa  Clark,  as  one  of  his  agents,  to  take  out  stock 
to  domestic  workers,  to  collect,  and  then  to  take  it  to  Boston  markets  or  to  jobbers. 


46       ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SBOE  INDUSTRY 

Brain  tree,  Randolph's  parent  town;  and  Daniel  Faxon  ^  of  South 
Randolph  together  with  Bass  and  Turner  who  had  a  general  store 
in  West  Randolph,  seem  to  have  ordered  or  taken  most  of  the 
shoes  made  in  Ebenezer  Belcher's  shop  until  1820.  Silas  Alden 
had  his  central  shop  on  the  main  street  of  the  central  village  of 
Randolph.   The  ledger  records  show: 

Silas  Alden  Dr.  to  Ebenezer  Belcher 
1807 

Aug.  21     To  making  15  pr.  Boy's  shoes $6.25 

Aug.  31      "          "      18  "   men's      "    7-5o 

"          "        7   "       "      b.  t.  shoes 2.92 

Oct.  24      "          "      12  "       "        "         "     5-00 

In  this  bill  for  making  shoes,  stock  was  not  included.  Silas 
Alden  paid  Ebenezer  Belcher  with  meal,  by  cash,  and  by  two 
orders,  one  on  Jonathan  Wales  for  $11.00  and  one  on  Drake  for 
$13.00. 

By  181 7  Bass  and  Turner,  who  had  the  chief  general  store  in 
the  town,  were  employing  Ebenezer  Belcher  steadily  to  make 
shoes.   They  must  have  been  furnishing  the  stock. 

1817 

Mar.    7  To  making  20  pare  of  men  shoes  2/ $6.67  ^ 

Mar.  20  "  "  50  "  "  "  "       " 16.67 

Apr.     I  "  "  68  "  "  "  "        " 22.67 

Apr.     8  "  "  5  "  "  "  "        " 1-67 

«  «  20  "  "  "  "        " 6.67 

May  27  "  «  10  «  "  "  "       " 3-34 

June  10  "  "  20  "  "  "  "     1/6 5.00 

June  24  «  "  20  «  "  "  "       "   5-00 

July   II  "  "  40  "  "  "  "       "   14.00 

July   15  "  "  15  "  "  "  "       "   ••• 3-75 

July   19  «  "  25  "  "  "  "        "    8.33 

Aug.  16  "  "  20  "  "  "  "2/    6.67 

Aug.  16  "  "  "  "  "  "  "1/6 5.00 

Sept.  II  "  "  40  "  "  "  "2/   13.33 

This  is  the  account  of  two  "runs,"  to  use  our  modern  phrase, 
the  summer  and  the  winter  seasons'  supply.  The  average  price 
for  making  a  pair  seems  about  i:^^  cents  but  the  average  output  is 

1  Daniel  Faxon  had  a  store  and  gave  out  leather  to  be  made  up.    He  also  took 
shoes  to  Boston  in  saddle  bags  and  on  his  return  brought  flour  and  other  groceries. 
*  Shilling  here  equalled  i6f  cents. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  47 

harder  to  estimate  accurately.  The  period  of  fourteen  days  be- 
tween March  7  and  20  shows  an  output  of  50  pair  from  Ebenezer 
Belcher's  workers,  but  between  June  10  and  24  only  20  pair  are 
the  apparent  product.  The  number  of  apprentices  whom  he  had 
that  spring  the  ledger  does  not  settle.  Some  years  he  kept  two 
apprentices  and  from  four  to  six  journeymen.  There  are  the 
names  of  eight  different  men  being  paid  by  Ebenezer  Belcher  for 
making  boots  between  1807  and  1809.  Much  of  the  work  ordered 
from  him  in  181 7  by  Bass  and  Turner  was  probably  done  by  other 
neighboring  shoemakers  in  their  own  domestic  shops,  or  in  the  ells 
or  kitchens  of  their  houses.  Meanwhile  Ebenezer  Belcher  was 
taking  orders  from  other  shoe  merchants  and  for  custom  work,^ 
besides  doing  mending.  The  accounts  would  seem  to  show  that 
while  the  merchants  furnished  the  stock  for  the  big  orders, 
Belcher  was  providing  it  for  custom  work  and  perhaps  for  some  of 
the  smaller  orders.  He  bought  his  leather,  sides  of  calf  skin 
generally,  of  John  White  of  Braintree  and  paid  him  in  cash  from 
$10  to  $15  at  a  time. 

1807 

Oct.    19    Account  of  John  White  and  Eben.  Belcher  by  5 

sides  of  lather $1350 

to  16  lbs.  of  lather 1.60 

"     2   "      "  oU 50 

Nov.  12      "    5  sides  of  Neets  lather  17/ 14.16 

30      "    4     "      "       "        "       17/ ^^ii 

"    2     "      "       "        "       17/3 5-75 

Dec.  19    by  6     "      "       "        " 17.50 

Evidently  Ebenezer  Belcher  was  doing  considerable  custom 
work  then  and  possibly  sale  work.  If  he  had  been  furnishing  the 
leather  for  the  shoes  at  Bass  and  Turner's  in  1817,  it  might  be 
thought  that  he  was  doing  belated  sale  work  and  leaving  it  on 
commission,  or  having  it  credited  outright  to  his  account.  The 
ledger  pages  show  definitely,  however,  that  he  was  paid  only  for 
work,  and  generally  only  the  one  process  *  of  making.  There  is  no 

*  Seth  Turner  Dr.  to  me  (Eben.  Belcher)  Sept.  3d,  1808. 

to  I  pare  of  women  shoes  7/     1.75     paid 
to  I  pare  of  women  shoes  7/     1.75 
{These  prices  include  stock  and  labor.     B.  E.  H.j 

*  An  exception  to  this  came  in  181 8  when  he  charged  Bass  and  Turner  for  cut- 


48        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

evidence  that  he  was  ever  an  entrepreneur  or  used  his  ten-footer 
as  a  central  shop.  He  remained  a  master  shoemaker  doing  work 
under  the  Domestic  System.  As  early  as  1810  when  Belcher  was 
working  for  Isaac  Thayer,  of  Randolph,  the  latter  was  furnishing 
the  stock  for  fairly  large  quantities.  From  May  20  to  August  11, 
Belcher  made  158  (2 2  +  14  +  22  +  100)  pair  of  men's  shoes  for 
him. 

He  sometimes  sold  both  farm  produce  and  stock  to  his  journey- 
men,^ and  to  his  domestic  workers.  Samuel  Ludden,  who  lived 
only  a  few  hundred  rods  away  from  Belcher's  house  and  worked 
on  shoes  pretty  regularly  for  him,  was  sometimes  credited  with 
doing  "15  pare"  at  a  time.  He  had  an  account  in  this  ledger 
where  he  was  debtor  to  Belcher  for  vamps  and  soles,  flax,  knives, 
and  leather  taps  and  for  Belcher's  horse  "to  Lincorns."  ^ 

Entrepreneurs  in  the  Shoe  Trade  and  Their  Central  Shops 

This  same  Lincoln's  corner  store,  at  the  cross  roads  (from 
Bridgewater  to  Boston  through  Braintree,  and  from  Randolph  to 

ting  for  them  100  pairs  of  boots.    In  later  years,  from  1836-40,  his  ledger  pages 
show  him  doing  work  on  uppers  "fitting  them,"  as  well  as  "making."   As  this  was 
generally  women's  work  by  that  time,  he  may  have  been  employing  some  members 
of  his  family  or  neighbors  to  do  it. 
1  Ambrose  Hollis  to  me,  1807 

To  I  lb.  of  flax,  to  1  half  Bushel  Corn $     .74 

"    meat  &  Butter 36 

1. 10 
By  making  11  pare  of  children  shoes 1.20 

To  I  peck  of  corn 00.27 

By  making  6  pare  of  children's  shoes 1.20 

■93 

By  making  8  pare  of  children's  shoes 1.60 

To  I  half  bush,  of  corn  to  i  lb.  of  flax .74 

.76 
^  This  was  to  Lincoln's  general  store  in  the  centre  of  the  East  Randolph  village. 
By  1 82 1,  Ludden  was  working  on  his  own  account  for  the  Littlefield  shoe  merchants 
in  East  Stoughton  (Avon)  and  often  hired  Eben.  Belcher's  horse  to  return  work 
and  get  more  stock. 


DOMESTIC  ST  AGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  49 

Weymouth),  was  a  beginning  of  the  large  Holbrook  shoe  manu- 
facture and  trade  which  flourished  in  the  last  seventy-five  years 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  At  first  as  a  general  store  it  dealt  in 
sale  shoes.  Then,  as  early  as  181 6,  Ephraim  Lincoln  bought  up 
or  had  made  for  him  quantities  of  shoes  and  took  them  into 
Boston  in  a  two-wheeled  hand  cart  made  for  him  for  this  pur- 
pose. He  was  one  of  the  first  entrepreneurs  who  was  not  a  shoe- 
maker. He  got  the  stock  in  Boston,  brought  it  back  for  "return 
cargo,"  and  had  it  cut  up  in  "his  shop"  in  the  grocery  store  and 
"put  it  out"  to  be  made  into  shoes.  He  developed  the  central 
shop  idea  and  finally  the  manufacturing  end  of  his  business  was 
of  more  importance  than  his  general  store.  His  experience  was 
fairly  common  and  typical  in  many  towns  of  Massachusetts.  His 
even  more  interesting  and  successful  contemporary,  Quincy  Reed 
of  Weymouth,  who  has  been  quoted  as  a  typical  early  shoe 
entrepreneur,'  marketed  and  produced  a  far  greater  supply  of 
shoes.  Reed's  brother,  Harvey,  seems  to  have  proved  the  organ- 
izer of  their  trade,  and  Quincy,  of  their  manufacture.  The  firm 
continued  until  1833.^  In  the  years  between  1809  and  the  year 
of  the  firm's  dissolution,  the  business  was  large  relatively  and 
positively. 

Other  Interests  atid  Ventures  of  Shoe  Entrepreneurs 

The  duties  of  the  Reed  brothers  in  their  Boston  store  and 
Weymouth  shop  in  the  early  days  of  business  (18 10-15),  i^^" 
eluded  cutting  out  stock  in  spare  moments;  cobbhng  to  repair 
customers'  old  shoes;  making  new  shoes  by  the  pair  for  individu- 
als, by  the  dozen  pair  for  jobbers;  and  selling  supplies  like  black- 
ing and  leather,  awls  and  tacks,  to  shoemakers.  This  fact  their 
simple  bookkeeping  shows  on  scores  of  pages.  In  the  decade  from 
1820-30,  their  correspondence,  bills  and  receipts,  and  ledgers  as 
well,  give  an  idea  of  other  more  compHcated  duties  and  dealings. 
When  Harvey  Reed  bought  a  whole  Maine  towTiship,  Quincy 

»  See  pp.  13,  14. 

'  This  date  is  particularly  interesting  to  students  of  the  development  of  the 
trade,  for  it  is  the  very  year  when  the  Batchellers  of  Brookfield  took  up  manu- 
facture for  that  same  Southern  planter  trade  along  the  seaboard  and  the  Gulf,  and 
up  the  Mississippi  River. 


50        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Reed  withstood  the  land  lure  and  had  for  a  side  issue  a  grain 
business,  which  kept  four  schooners  ^  busy  in  the  coastwise  trade, 
and  with  Spain.  The  files  of  bills  of  lading  show  the  details  of 
this  enterprise. 

Sales  were  made  in  the  cities  of  the  United  States  between  Boston  and 
New  Orleans.  Branch  houses  were  established  in  Richmond  and  New  Or- 
leans, where  business  up  the  Mississippi  River  was  immense.  They  also  sold 
largely  of  certain  kinds  of  goods  to  the  West  Indies;  and  in  return  made 
large  importations  of  sugar  and  molasses.  Mr.  Harvey  Reed  was  a  man  of 
remarkable  ability.  He  had  the  care  of  the  outside  business  of  the  firm,  at- 
tending to  its  larger  interests  in  the  South  and  elsewhere.  I  think  he  was  one 
of  the  original  promoters  of  the  Union  Bank  of  Weymouth  and  Braintree, 
and  of  the  Weymouth  Savings  Bank.  Having  become  largely  interested  in 
Maine  lands,  he  removed  to  Bangor  in  1833  where  he  carried  on  for  twenty- 
five  years  a  large  lumbering  business  until  his  death  in  1859.* 

These  facts  about  the  banking  and  land  interests  have  been 
added  here,  even  if  they  exceed  the  limits  of  our  period  to  1837, 
because  Mr.  Harvey  Reed's  interests  as  an  entrepreneur  shoe 
merchant  are  so  typical.  Not  only  the  Littlefields  of  East 
Stoughton,  but  also  the  Aldens  of  Randolph,  the  Batchellers  of 
Brookfield,  the  Newhalls  in  Lynn,  all  in  turn  becoming  leaders  in 
their  communities  in  bringing  in  banking  facilities  and  in  investing 
in  distant  lands,  whether  in  Maine  or  Texas  or  Louisiana,  some- 
times taking  them  over  for  debt  but  oftener  as  an  investment  for 
the  large  profits  gained  in  their  shoe  manufacture  and  trade.  The 
Littlefield  brothers  of  East  Stoughton  (now  Avon),  who  were 
making  money  in  the  Cuban  and  New  Orleans  trade,  invested 
over  $80,000  in  Aroostook  County  land  before  1836.  They 
''pulled  out  before  that  money  was  lost"  in  the  general  hard  times 
of  1837,  because  they  needed  ready  money  for  the  New  Orleans 
trade.  There  the  business  amounted  to  $100,000  a  year  between 
1828  and  1837,  but  in  the  early  40's,  the  results  of  mismanage- 
ment and  the  general  effects  of  the  financial  depression  combined 

^  These  were  the  days  of  simple  transportation  facilities.  In  181 2,  Noah  Thayer, 
of  Randolph,  drove  an  ox  team  to  Richmond,  Va.,  with  shoes  made  up  for  such  an 
export  venture.   He  brought  back  a  load  of  corn  and  cotton. 

2  This  is  quoted  from  J.  W.  Porter,  who  interviewed  Quincy  Reed  in  1885,  when 
he  was  ninety-one  years  old,  and  published  the  facts  in  the  Bangor  Historical 
Magazine,  vol.  I,  August,  1885. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  5  I 

to  bring  bad  debts,  so  that  the  firm  had  to  be  content  to  take 
payments  in  lands  in  Mississippi  and  Texas  just  when  land  was  a 
drug  on  the  market.^ 

The  Littlejield  Brothers  as  Typical  Entrepreneurs  in  the  Shoe 

Industry 

These  Littlefield  brothers  of  East  Stoughton  began  their  work 
as  entrepreneurs  in  the  shoe  manufacture  and  trade  a  little  before 
1815.  There  were  four  of  them,  Nathaniel,  James,  Isaac,  and 
Darius.^  They  divided  the  duties  of  capitalists,  manufacturers, 
and  salesmen  between  them.  Mr.  Darius  Littletield  used  to 
drive  into  Boston  Monday  and  stay  until  Wednesday,  and  again 
on  Thursday  and  stay  until  Saturday,  "at  Wilde's  Hotel"  as  it 
seemed  necessary  to  add.  Mr.  James  Littlefield  was  a  travelling 
salesman.  He  never  tired  of  telling  of  the  hard  times  of  18 16-17 
the  "froze  to  death"  year,  when  the  crops  were  so  short  that  he 
took  pay  in  the  South  for  his  shoes  in  flour  and  sold  it  for  a  good 
price  and  big  profit  up  North.  He  had  Philadelphia  and  Virginia 
trade,  and  sold  brogans  to  the  far  South,  even  to  New  Orleans, 
and  over  in  Cuba.  They  transported  them  in  hair  trunks  about 
the  size  of  a  present  day  wooden  case  or  box  for  boots,  instead 
of  the  casks  used  for  earlier  trade.  Casks  were  sent  still,  how- 
ever, to  Cuba,  whether  this  was  because  they  were  better  adapted 
to  ocean  freight  or  to  get  the  hogsheads  there  ready  for  return 
cargo  of  molasses,  it  is  hard  to  determine.  They  had,  like  many 
other  entrepreneurs  in  the  shoe  business  then,  a  grocery  store. 
Mr.  Darius  Littlefield  was  taken  into  the  firm  in  182 1.  By  1822 
he  had  got  an  appointment  as  postmaster,  for,  as  he  naively  con- 
fessed in  later  years,  his  New  Orleans  mail  was  heavy  and  as 
postmaster  he  could  frank  his  own  mail. 

By  having  the  grocery  store  where  his  goods,  bought  at  whole- 
sale, could  be  paid  out  at  retail  prices  to  his  domestic  workers, 

'  Cf.  p.  52  for  more  details. 

'  All  this  information  was  Riven  to  me  orally  in  IQ08,  by  Mrs.  Varnum,  who 
was  the  grandchild  of  Uarius  Littletield.  She  was  getting  it  from  her  father  Cyrus 
Littlefield,  then  living  at  the  age  of  eighty-si.x  years  but  too  feeble  to  talk  to  a 
stranger.  From  his  reminiscences  and  answers  to  direct  questions  she  was  able  to 
gather  much  material  of  value  for  this  study. 


52        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

or  on  orders  from  other  manufacturers,  he  got  rid  of  paying  wages 
in  cash.  Mr.  Nathaniel  Littlefield  moved  to  Randolph  and  built 
a  house  and  later  a  shop,  where  he  continued  manufacturing  as 
well  as  keeping  up  his  share  of  financial  interest  in  the  East 
Stoughton  shop  where  his  brother  Darius  was  in  charge.  When 
Mr.  Isaac  Littlefield  died  in  New  Orleans  of  the  yellow  fever  in 
1836,  none  of  the  family  could  go  so  far  in  the  hard  times  to  settle 
the  business  there,  and  it  was  left  in  charge  of  clerks  or  agents. 
Through  them  the  firm  tried  to  collect  the  New  Orleans  store 
debts  and  had  to  take  lands  in  payment  in  many  instances.  In 
1845  the  firm  of  Littlefield  Brothers  failed  in  East  Stoughton  on 
account  of  their  loss  of  the  earlier  well  organized  market  for  bro- 
gans  for  slaves,  as  well  as  on  account  of  their  uncollected  bills. 
In  1846,  Mr.  Nathaniel  Littlefield  went  South  to  see  about  prop- 
erties there.  These  were  in  Mississippi  and  Texas  and  proved  in 
the  end  to  be  a  "dead  loss." 

The  Littlefields  and  their  Domestic  Workers 

During  the  years  when  the  Littlefield  firm  was  flourishing, 
from  1 81 5  to  at  least  1837,  the  domestic  workers  came  from 
miles  around  to  the  central  shop  to  "take  out"  work;  women  got 
boot  legs  to  side  up  and  cord ;  men  got  boots  to  last  and  bottom 
for  their  own  work,  and  straps  to  stick,  tops  and  counters  to  sew 
on  for  their  children's  work.  All  the  members  of  a  family,  often- 
times of  a  whole  community  would  be  found  working  on  boots. 
The  competition  among  the  numerous  workers,  for  now  they 
did  not  need  to  be  skilled  shoemakers  but  oftentimes  just  men  or 
women  or  children  each  knowing  how  to  accomplish  one  process, 
made  it  unnecessary  for  the  entrepreneurs  to  send  out  the  work. 
Rows  of  beach  wagons  ^  stood  along  the  fence  before  the  Littlefield 
shoe  shop  many  times  a  week,  even  as  early  as  1830.  People  had 
come  from  Abington,  Mansfield  and  Middleborough,  as  well  as 
from  neighboring  towns,  like  the  Randolphs  and  Bridgewaters. 
Many  an  entry  in  the  account  books  of  Ebenezer  Belcher  of 

^  Beach  wagons  were  two-seated,  but  could  be  made  four-seated  and  the  back 
leather  curtain  could  be  raised  when  the  back  seat  was  slipped  under  the  front  seat, 
so  as  to  put  in  a  case  of  boots. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  53 

South  Randolph  gives  evidence  of  what  neighboring  shoemakers 
were  "taking  out"  shoes,  and  later  boots,  "to  make  for  Little- 
field's." 

Shoe  Entrepreneurs  in  Natick,  Mass. 

A  picture  of  the  domestic  shoemakers  of  Natick,  Massachu- 
setts, going  for  stock  in  this  Domestic  Stage,  or  having  it  taken 
to  them,  is  given  by  Mr.  Isaac  Felch.^ 

The  shoes  were  put  out  to  be  bottomed  in  little  shops  all  over  the  com- 
munity. The  quarters  were  to  be  bound,  the  uppers  dosed,  and  the  stock 
for  it  was  carted  to  these  workmen.  My  Uncle  Asa  was  the  first  man  ^  in 
Natick  to  make  shoes  to  sell  for  the  Boston  Market.  It  was  in  1836  or  1837. 
I  have  heard  father  tell  of  the  Boston  merchants  coming  out  to  meet  Uncle 
Asa  at  the  toll  gates '  of  the  Worcester  Turnpike,  to  secure  his  shoes.  The 
first  time  they  failed  to  meet  him,  he  thought  the  bottom  had  fallen  out  of 
the  business. 

This  Isaac  Felch's  father  gave  up  a  contractor's  transportation 
business  between  Lake  Champlain  and  Boston,  through  Natick, 
with  a  six-horse  team  when  the  new  railroad  began  seriously  to 
take  away  his  trade,*  and  joined  his  brother  Asa  in  the  shoe  in- 
dustry.^ 

Oliver  Bacon,  in  his  History  of  Natick,  speaks  of  the  construc- 
tion of  this  Boston  and  Worcester  Railroad  in  1835,  as  giving  a 

'  Mr.  Isaac  Felch  wrote  for  me  on  his  eightieth  birthday,  in  1913,  an  account 
of  his  connection  with  the  early  Natick  boot  industry. 

2  Both  Bacon's  History  of  Natick,  p.  152,  and  Kurd's  Middlesex  History  (vol.  I, 
p.  554)  say  that  the  Walcotts  did  a  shoe  business  for  outside  merchants,  i.  e.,  "sales 
shoes,"  before  1835,  beginning  in  1828.  This  is  disputed  by  the  Felch  brothers. 
Bacon  (p.  153)  says  that  Isaac  Felch  began  business  in  1836  and  for  the  next 
five  years  employed  seventy-seven  persons  in  making  and  preparing  the  shoes  to 
be  made.  During  this  time  the  average  number  of  shoes  made  was  3i,2cxd  pairs. 
Bacon  quotes  figures  for  the  volume  of  the  John  B.  Walcott  business  in  1835  as 
4050  pairs;  1836  as  11,000  pairs;  in  1837,  as  8310  pairs. 

3  Seemingly  where  the  present  Back  Bay  of  Boston  is  located. 

*  By  a  curious  incident,  he  put  the  axe  at  his  own  tree  —  for  he  contracted  to 
bring  the  iron  rails  for  the  Albany  Railroad,  that  were  used  for  the  tracks  through 
Natick. 

'  Asa  Felch  made  shoes  first  in  an  ell,  cutting  out,  making  up  about  sixty  pairs 
at  a  time,  and  taking  them  to  Boston  to  sell.  Then  when  Isaac  Felch,  Sr.,  joined  his 
brother,  they  made  brogans  in  a  barn  on  their  land,  in  a  room  upstairs.  Mr.  Henry 
Felch  has  his  father's  big  cutting  knife  now.  It  was  only  the  cutting  and  crown- 
ing which  was  done  in  that  barn-loft-factory,  for  the  work  was  put  out,  as  described 
above,  to  domestic  workers. 


54       ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

new  impulse  to  the  shoe  business,  because  it  cost  less  thereafter  to 
transport  both  leather  stock  and  finished  shoes  and  a  new  era 
began  for  Natick.  This  town  had  been  relatively  late  and  slow  in 
the  developing  of  its  industrial  conditions,  as  compared  with  other 
shoe  towns.  In  1805  "it  had  a  population  of  700,  and  scarce  a 
common  road  worthy  of  the  name,  and  hostihty  between  the 
north  and  south  ends  of  the  town  was  at  its  height."  By  1825, 
comforts  began  to  increase;  desks  for  the  school  house  appeared, 
and  the  roads  were  gravelled.  Most  of  the  people  were  industrious 
and  frugal  farmers.  By  1835,  j'^st  when  the  shoe  industry  of 
Natick  went  out  of  the  Handicraft  Stage  ^  into  the  Domestic 
Stage,  there  was  "energy,  action,  new  life  in  every  direction.  .  .  . 
The  stage  coach  and  ponderous  ox- wagon  had  passed.  .  .  .  The 
light  chaise  and  spirited  horse  were  seen  rolhng  along  over  the 
newly  laid  out  turnpike."  Of  course  this  new  hfe  and  growth  are 
the  characteristics  common  to  all  Massachusetts  towns  at  this  era 
of  the  prosperous  inflation  years  which  preceded  the  panic  year  of 
1837.  Yet  Natick  survived  those  years  of  financial  depression 
with  greater  ease,  perhaps  because  her  manufacturing  ventures 
were  just  beginning  and  there  was  not  enough  spare  capital  to  be 
put  into  the  larger  outside  investments  which  engulfed  financial 
undertakings  ^  of  other  towns.  Natick's  career  as  a  boot  town, 
however,  except  for  the  beginnings  made  by  the  Felch  and  the 
Walcott  firms,  belongs  to  the  last  phase  of  the  Domestic  System 
from  1837  to  1855,  the  days  of  Henry  Wilson's  boot-making 
career. 

^  Just  what  particular  person  or  event  was  the  impulse  here  is  not  recorded.  I 
find  a  tradition  among  men  over  seventy-five  years  of  age  that  a  certain  French- 
man whose  name  "  began  with  Le ' '  came  from  Beverly  and  taught  Henry  Wilson 

how  to  make  brogans.  Was  he  the  link  between  the  new  Lynn-Beverly  Domestic 
System  and  the  old  regime  where  Uncle  Eph  Whitney  was  the  "Cobbler  of  Na- 
tick"? 

^  Barber  in  his  Historical  Collections  of  Massachusetts  gives  the  shoe  business 
of  Natick  in  1837  as  250,650  pairs  of  shoes,  valued  at  $213,052.50.  Males  em- 
ployed, 263;  and  females,  189.     Cf.  Appendix  XVIII. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  55 

The  Shoe  Trade  of  Brookfield,  Massachusetts,  and  the 
Batchellers  as  Entrepreneurs 

Brookfield  was  still  another  town  which  had  its  rise  and  rapid 
progress  as  a  boot  and  shoe  centre  in  this  period  from  18 10  to 
1837.  The  early  years  of  the  town's  life  while  it  was  called  Qua- 
baug,  during  its  Home  Stage  and  Handicraft  Stage  in  the  shoe 
industry,  have  been  described.  By  1810,  it  was  still  in  the  town 
economy  stage  of  finance  and  industry,  with  no  export  relations. 
That  year  marked  the  advent  of  Oliver  Ward  and  Tyler  Batchel- 
ler,  shoemakers  from  Grafton.  From  contemporary  account 
books  of  a  general  provision  store  of  that  village,  we  get  a  picture 
of  the  town  life  into  which  they  had  come  to  project  their  shoe- 
making  activities. 

General  Economic  Conditions  in  Brookfield 

The  week  of  June  19  to  26  of  18 13  seems  to  have  been  either  a 
gala  time  in  the  Brookfield  villages,  or  else  the  opening  week  of 
Skinner  and  Ward's  general  provision  store.'  Some  accounts  in 
the  firm's  ledger  opened  during  those  days  with  a  charge  for 
"calicoa,"  or  sugar  or  salt,  but  most  of  them  with  a  charge  of 
"i  pt.  Brandy"  or  "2  pts.  N.  Rum."  There  were  two  hundred 
and  fifty-eight  pages  in  one  ledger  bearing  the  first  date  1813, 
each  with  a  new  account.  These  pages  represent  that  same  num- 
ber of  customers  and  give  an  impression  of  sales  made  to  people 
from  outside  the  Brookfield  villages.  The  next  eighty-eight  pages 
take  entries  for  18 14  and  181 5,  while  the  earlier  pages  carried  on 
the  first  customers.  The  index  -  shows  the  names  of  seven  hun- 
dred and  sixty  different  customers,  and  supposedly  the  heads  of 
so  many  families.    Rum,  candles,  tea,  sugar,  spices,  gin,  and  salt 

'  The  Skinner  and  Ward  books  were  owned  in  1908  by  Mr.  Henry  Twitchcll  of 
Brookfield  and  treasured  under  the  eaves  of  his  house. 

2  50  A's  2  E's  25  J's  10  N's  47  S's 

88  B's  27  F's  10  K's  16  O's  14  T's 

S3  C's  14  G's  15  L's  22  P's  18  U's 

48  D's  104  II's  43  M's  74  R's  80  W's 

Total  760  names 


56        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

are  the  most  familiar  and  recurrent  entries  in  every  one  of  these 
personal  accounts.  Sometimes  a  looking  glass,  or  twine,  or  paper, 
some  silk,  calico,  and  bedticking  are  mentioned.  The  payment  ^ 
is  often  in  kind,  in  service,  with  only  occasional  credits  of  cash. 

While  many  people  in  the  villages  of  Brookfield  were  weaving 
for  Skinner  and  Ward,  they  were  probably  doing  custom  work 
or  bespoke  work  for  their  fellow  townsmen.  There  was  also  a 
firm,  known  as  the  Branch  Cotton  Manufacturing  Company, 
which  was  doing  a  good  business  with  the  Skinner  and  Ward 
store.  Messrs.  DoUiver  and  Norwell  were  seUing  shoes  (August  9, 

1813)  to  the  amount  of  $62.26  and  (October  9,  1813)  $14.54  and 
(October  27,  1813)  $30.60,  to  Skinner,  Ward  and  Co.  Here  were 
sale  shoes  for  a  local  market  sold  to  stray  customers,  not  to 
jobbers. 

From  another  book  showing  the  stocktaking  returns  of  this 
same  Skinner  firm  in  July  of  18 14  and  June  of  1815  I  can  draw, 
for  myself  at  least,  a  pretty  clear  picture  of  that  store.  The  en- 
tries show  the  range  of  prices,  the  variety  of  stock,^  the  amount 
of  stock  on  hand.  The  notes  ^  receivable  were  mostly  on  short 
time  (three  months).  The  size  of  the  accounts  receivable,  pure 
credits  not  secured  by  notes,  running  up  to  $5256.38  for  that 
year,  was  seldom  more  than  $50  for  any  one  individual.  The  firm 
of  Darius  Hovey  and  Co.  had  run  up  a  bill  to  over  $100  and  John 

^  Mr.  William  Upham  paid  his  store  bill  with  corn  and  by  weaving  shirting. 
In  November  of  each  year,  a  hog,  weighing  from  168  to  190  pounds,  was  credited  to 
his  account.  The  remainder  of  his  indebtedness  was  cancelled  by  cash.  Here  we 
see  the  only  evidences  left  to  us  of  one  WiUiam  Upham,  who  in  the  industrial  life 
of  the  community  figured  as  a  Handicraft  master  or  Domestic  worker.  He  was  a 
farmer  with  the  by-employment  of  weaving. 

Calvin  Davis,  meanwhile  was  weaving  and  fulling  cloth.    Sometimes  (April  9, 

1814)  he  was  weaving  79  yards  No.  81  and  52  yards  No.  82,  which  were  credited  to 
him  for  $9.69.  Again  (May  3),  he  was  credited  for  $6.37  in  return  for  51  yards  of 
bedticking  which  he  wove  for  Skinner  and  Ward.  This  is  the  way  he  paid  for  snuff, 
sugar,  garden  seed,  molasses,  yarn,  and  milk  pans,  as  well  as  for  his  shoes;  also  for 
a  hat  purchased  during  those  same  weeks.  The  fact  that  he  paid  in  part  by  a  hog, 
and  cider,  and  bought  garden  seed  and  milk  pans,  suggests  that  he  was  a  weaver- 
farmer,  doing  extra  sales  work  on  venture  or  else  as  a  domestic  worker  for  the  orders 
of  Skinner  and  Ward. 

^  Stock  valued  on  that  date  at  $1902.49. 

^  Notes  receivable  valued  (with  interest)  at  $385.76.   Cash  on  hand  $220.20. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  5  7 

Ward,  a  manufacturer,  owed  $135  on  July  11,  1814.  The  debts 
payable  by  Skinner  and  Ward  at  that  date  amounted  to  $3360. 
Therefore,  stock  and  cash  on  hand  and  notes  receivable  and  ac- 
counts owed  to  Skinner  and  Ward  Co.  more  than  balanced  the 
amount  of  the  firm's  indebtedness.  That  some  of  the  stock  was 
practically  worthless  or  at  least  unmarketable  is  suggested  by 
finding  "seven  old  Fur  hats  and  three  felt  boys'  hats"  in  one 
annual  inventory  after  another. 

Rise  of  Organized  Shoe  Industry  in  Brookfield 

Up  to  this  decade  (1810-1820)  the  community  had  been  de- 
pendent upon  its  agriculture  mainly,  although  some  weaving  was 
being  done  for  other  than  home  consumption.  The  shoemakers 
were  attending  only  to  the  demands  of  definite  customers,  with 
occasional  sale  or  "  extra  "  shoes  for  the  local  stores.  When  in  1810 
Oliver  Ward  had  come  to  town,  and  by  his  work  and  enterprise, 
coupled  with  that  of  the  Batcheller  brothers,  made  Brookfield  a 
typical  shoe  town,  its  shoe  industry  passed  out  of  the  extra  sale 
shoe  phase  of  the  Handicraft  Period  through  the  period  of  spe- 
cialization for  certain  markets  ^  and  of  the  rise  of  the  central  shop 
where  stock  cutting  and  inspection,  as  well  as  packing  and  ship- 
ping, could  be  done  under  the  supervision  of  the  entrepreneur. 

The  first  shoes  Batcheller  made  were  chiefly  of  a  low-priced 
quality,  especially  adapted  to  the  southern  trade.  He  packed 
these  in  empty  flour  barrels,  consigned  them  to  a  middleman  who 
ran  a  line  of  sailing  packets  between  Boston  and  Havana,  and 
realized  a  good  profit.  He  continually,  though  cautiously,  en- 
larged his  business,  both  his  central  shop  and  stock,  number  of 
workers  and  customers.  In  1824  he  took  his  brother  in  as  partner. 

The  Batcheller  Brogan  for  Export  Trade  in  South  and  West 

The  firm,  before  the  30's,  had  added  to  their  business  the  manu- 
facture of  "Batcheller's  Retail  Brogan,"  a  shoe  adapted  to  the 
New  England  trade  and  "  kept  for  sale  in  all  the  stores  in  this  and 
many  neighboring  towns."  Their  main  business  was  still  the 
manufacture  of  brogans  for  the  southern  and  western  States. 

'  See  Appendix  XVI. 


58        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Meanwhile  both  the  factory  and  the  firm  had  been  enlarged.  By 
1 83 1  the  new  firm  introduced  the  manufacture  of  the  russet  bro- 
gan  for  the  southern  slaves,  the  first  that  were  made  in  Massa- 
chusetts, and  this  became  their  leading  product. 

Summary  oj  the  Development  of  the  Brookfields  as  a  Shoe 

Trade  Centre 

Here  then,  we  have  another  simple  though  fairly  graphic  ac- 
count of  the  rise  of  entrepreneurs  of  the  Domestic  System  in  the 
first  stage.  The  Batcheller  brothers  entered  the  lists  in  the  last 
phase  of  the  Handicraft  Period  in  Brookfield,  with  the  idea  of  sale 
shoes  not  as  mere  extras  in  local  stores,  but  as  a  venture  for  ex- 
port trade  to  the  South.  With  capital  accumulated  from  the- first 
ventures,  they  built  up  a  business  which  outgrew  a  shoemaker's 
shop  with  its  small  group  of  apprentices  and  journeymen,  and 
embarked  upon  the  Central  Shop,  specializing  for  a  definite  mar- 
ket. Before  1835,  they  were  putting  out  stock  to  workmen  in 
their  small  shops  in  Brookfield  and  in  most  of  the  towns  in  the 
vicinity,  in  some  instances  the  stock  being  carried  to  a  distance  of 
twenty  or  thirty  miles.  Besides  this,  they  had  a  jobbing  house  in 
Boston,  and  regular  customers  in  the  South  and  West.^ 

The  volume  of  business  done  by  this  T.  and  E.  Batcheller  firm 
in  1832  was  65,000  pairs,  to  the  cash  value  of  $52,000.  The  firm 
increased  its  output  steadily.  Meanwhile  another  North  Brook- 
field firm,  Deming  and  Edwards,  organized  a  large  business  in 
1835.  In  1837,  they  moved  into  a  three-story  shop  which  they 
built  in  the  centre  of  the  village,  and  specialized  in  russet  brogans 
and  coarse  thick  boots  designed  for  the  southern  trade.  That 
same  year  they  established  a  boot  and  shoe  house  in  Mobile, 
Alabama,  where  they  had  already  a  considerable  trade  with  the 
planters  along  the  Tombigbee  River.  The  slaves  for  whom  these 
planters  were  buying  shoes,  had  "feet  of  enormous  size,"  and 
their  measures,  marked  Tom,  Pete,  Sam,  Joe,  etc.,  on  slips  of 
paper,  were  sent  North  with  the  orders,  and  then  returned  tucked 
inside  the  respective  shoes.  Even  in  the  hard  panic  years,  1837- 
39,  this  new  firm  was  not  only  expanding,  but  even  flourishing, 
^  See  Appendix  XVII,  for  details  taken  from  Batcheller  accounts. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  59 

probably  because  of  two  important  facts  —  (i)  it  was  not  loaded 
with  old,  uncollectible  debts;  and  (2),  it  could  get  the  customers  of 
the  firms  who  were  faihng  and  going  out  of  business. 

The  Development  of  Southern,  West  Indian  and  South 
American  Markets  for  Shoes 

Perhaps  no  one  autobiography  has  furnished  more  light  on  the 
southern  and  West  Indian  shoe  trade  than  that  of  Seth  Bryant. ^ 
He  gives  with  vividness  of  detail  and  closest  familiarity  the  facts 
concerning  not  only  the  distant  markets  but  the  manufacturers 
and  jobbers  who  supplied  them.  He  naively  claims  that  all  Lynn 
manufacturers  made  the  store  of  Mitchell  and  Bryant,  on  Broad 
Street,  Boston,  their  headquarters  from  1824.  "Mitchell  and 
Bryant  had  the  first  wholesale  boot  and  shoe  house  in  Boston.  All 
the  other  dealers  at  that  time  were  jobbers  and  kept  all  kinds  of 
shoes.  .  .  .  Mitchell  and  Bryant  specialized  in  men's  heavy  goods. 
Russet  and  black  brogans  were  manufactured  in  HolUston,  Mass., 
and  we  sold  nearly  all  the  shoes  which  were  manufactured  there, 
and  also  kip  brogans  and  copper  nailed  shoes  for  the  West  India 
trade,  made  in  Joppa."  ^ 

Lynn  manufacturers  were  helped  by  the  firm  Mitchell  and 
Bryant  who  sold  only  men's  shoes  to  secure  customers  for  women's 
shoes  in  which  Lynn  had  long  specialized.  "We  had  a  large 
southern  and  western  trade  with  the  grocery  men,  dry  goods  and 
hardware  men.  They  could  keep  our  goods  and  sell  them  by  the 
case,  and  some  of  them  could  work  off  a  great  many  cases  in  a 
year.  .  .  .   We  helped  set  up  young  shoe  firms  out  West. 

"Messrs.  Micajah  Pratt  and  Nathan  Breed  of  Lynn  came  to 
my  store  in  Boston  one  day  and  said  there  were  a  couple  of  young 
men  who  wanted  to  open  a  shoe  store  in  St.  Louis.  They  were 
very  capable,  enterprising  young  men  of  undoubted  integrity  — 
without  sufficient  capital.  They  (Mr.  Pratt  and  Mr.  Breed)  were 
going  to  let  the  young  men.  Hood  and  Abbott,  have  $500  worth 

'  Shoe  and  Leather  Trade  of  the  last  hundred  years  by  Seth  Bryant.  Published 
in  Ashmont,  Mass.,  i89i,p.  26. 

-  Joppa  was  a  part  of  Bridgewater  where  Seth  Bryant  began  life,  and  manu- 
factured for  many  years. 


6o        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

each  of  their  Lynn  goods  and  wanted  me  to  put  in  $500  worth  of 
my  men's  goods.  They  said  if  Hood  and  Abbott  succeeded  they 
would  be  good  future  customers,  so  I  (Seth  Bryant  of  Mitchell 
and  Bryant)  put  in  $500  goods  and  got  Joseph  Hunt  of  Abington 
to  put  in  $500  of  his  fine  Abington  goods.  Hood  and  Abbott 
started  then  in  St.  Louis  and  became  very  successful  merchants. 
I  believe  I  sold  Hood  and  Abbott  a  million  dollars  worth  of  goods 
after  that.  I  presume  Lynn  manufacturers  have  started  a  great 
many  others  in  the  same  way."  ^ 

Of  all  the  jobbers  and  middlemen  in  southern  markets,  John  W. 
Houghton  seems  to  have  had  the  most  interesting  career.  He  was 
bom  in  Harvard,  Mass.,  in  1787,  and  came  to  Lynn  at  the  age  of 
nineteen,  fresh  from  his  Harvard  home  to  seek  his  fortune.  He 
trudged  to  Lynn,  and  went  to  live  with  his  brother-in-law  with 
whom  he  served  his  time.  Then  he  commenced  manufacturing 
under  the  name  of  Jayne  and  Houghton  in  1813.  Business  was  not 
successful  and  Mr.  Houghton,  becoming  somewhat  disheartened 
but  not  discouraged,  left  Lynn.  He  went  to  Newark,  N.  J.,  and 
attempted  to  manufacture  shoes  but  was  not  successful,  so  he 
took  about  $600  worth  of  goods  and  journeyed  South  to  Savannah. 
When  he  arrived  he  had  only  twenty-five  cents  left,  but  he  was 
hopeful.  Taking  his  effects  up  the  river  to  Augusta,  he  opened  a 
store  and  eventually  was  successful. 

He  added  gradually  to  his  shoe  trade  so  his  establishment  be- 
came a  regular  out-fitting  store  where  planters  from  the  country 
could  obtain  whatever  supplies  they  desired  for  master  and  slave, 
"from  a  bell-top  hat  to  a  pair  of  peaked-toed  shoes."  The  store 
in  Augusta  was  in  a  crowded  business  quarter  near  the  market 
house  on  Broad  Street  and  supplied  the  trade  with  well-to-do 
planters  of  both  South  Carolina  and  North  Carolina.  Houghton's 
goods  were  being  manufactured  in  the  North,  the  most  extensive 
orders  coming  from  New  England.  Houghton  bought  a  planta- 
tion twelve  miles  out  of  Augusta  and  erected  "Yankee  House"; 
laid  out  grounds  in  northern  style  and  built  a  school  house  on  the 
premises,  containing  2400  acres,  for  his  fifty  negro  slaves.  By  his 
will  he  gave  freedom  to  these  slaves  and  left  $4000  to  the  executor 

^  Bryant,  Shoe,  etc.,  pp.  25-27.   Not  an  exact  quotation. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  6 1 

to  use  in  defraying  their  expenses  to  the  seaboard  where  the 
American  Colonization  Society  would  take  them  in  charge  to 
send  them  back  to  Liberia.  He  gave  another  $4000  for  the  erec- 
tion of  a  school  house  for  poor  children  of  the  parish  to  be  known 
as  Houghton  Institute.  Bryant  in  closing  this  naive  account  says 
that  Houghton  was  one  of  the  largest  and  best  customers  of 
Mitchell  and  Bryant's  wholesale  shoe  business  in  Boston,  buying 
russet  and  black  brogans  for  the  southern  plantation,  often  lots 
worth  $20,000  to  $30,000  at  a  time,  to  be  shipped  to  Savannah 
and  up  the  river  to  Augusta.^ 

West  Indian  Trade 

It  was  not  alone  for  markets  in  our  southern  states  that  Bryant 
and  Mitchell  were  manufacturing  boots  and  shoes.  They  were 
supplying  West  Indian  markets  through  Spofford  and  Tileston, 
jobbers  of  New  York.  These  shoes  were  packed  in  Havana  sugar 
boxes,  75  to  no  pairs  to  a  box,  and  shipped  from  Joppa,  Mass., 
to  New  York  by  way  of  Providence,  R.  1?  "I  generally  went  on 
the  same  vessel  which  carried  the  shoes.^  No  steam  boats  were 
run  till  about  1824  and  all  water  transportation  had  to  be  in  sail- 
ing vessels.  I  sold  for  $1.25  per  pair  those  shoes  to  Spofford  and 
Tileston,  who  shipped  most  of  them  to  Cuba."  They  bought  also 
of  Abner  Curtis  of  Rockland,  Mass.,  who  used  to  drive  into 
Broad  Street,  Boston,  with  four  gray  horses,  his  wagon  loaded 
heavily  with  calf  shoes  and  nailed  brogans,  all  of  which  were 
shipped  in  schooners. 

Samuel  Train  was  still  another  New  England  entrepreneur 
who  made  a  success  of  the  southern  shoe  trade  from  his  store  at 
No.  28  Mercantile  Row,  Boston.  "He  started  on  foot  from  his 
home  in  New  Hampshire  for  Boston,  with  his  pack  on  his  back, 
sat  down  under  some  elm  trees  in  Medford  and  ate  the  last  food 
in  his  pack  and  when  he  arrived  in  Boston,  he  was  the  possessor 

Cf.  Bryant,  Shoe,  etc.,  pp.  9-18. 

*  As  it  was  before  the  days  of  railways,  the  shoes  were  hauled  overland  from 
the  manufactory  in  Joppa  (near  Bridgewater,  Mass.)  to  Providence,  without  ever 
being  shipped  to  the  Boston  store  of  Mitchell  and  Bryant. 

*  Bryant,  p.  49. 


62        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

of  only  fifty  cents.  He  commenced  business  at  the  foot  of  the 
ladder.  He  did  a  large  business,  shipping  his  shoes  in  flour  bar- 
rels, packed  as  nicely  as  crackers.  He  shipped  to  Charleston  and 
Savannah.  He  became  a  large  real  estate  and  shipowner  and  was 
a  man  of  excellence  in  every  respect.  He  bought  the  place  in  Med- 
ford  where  he  sat  as  a  boy  under  the  elms  and  ate  the  last  loaf. 
He  gave  the  trade  much  dignity."  ^ 

Mr.  Bryant  tells  also  of  A.  and  H.  Reed  of  South  Weymouth 
and  of  Mr.  James  Littlefield  of  E.  Stoughton  who  were  manu- 
facturing for  the  Cuban  trade.  The  latter  was  so  well  known  to 
the  Cuba  markets  that  Spaniards  came  to  Littlefield 's  Boston 
oflSce  and  made  their  purchase  in  person. 

When  Bryant  and  Mitchell  somewhat  later  began  to  manu- 
facture directly  for  the  West  Indian  Trade,  including  Cuba,  San 
Domingo  and  Hayti,  they  made  a  light  calf  nailed  brogan.  They 
sent  20  or  30  cases  of  shoes.  For  these  Cuban  sugar,  brown  and 
white,  was  taken  in  exchange.  The  white  was  shipped  in  turn  to 
St.  Petersburg,  Russia,  where  Russian  calfskins  in  an  untanned 
condition  were  secured.  Some  of  the  brown  sugar  was  shipped  to 
Trieste  and  opium  brought  back  for  payment.^  All  of  the  shoes 
they  sent  to  Hayti  were  traded  for  coffee  which  they  imported  in 
quite  large  quantities.  These  are  evidences  of  the  existence  of 
more  three-cornered  trade  which  included  New  England  and  the 
West  Indies. 

South  American  Trade 

With  South  America,  the  shoe  trade  had  been  developed  by 
Augustus  Hemenway  of  Boston,  who  had  five  or  six  ships  running 
to  Valparaiso,  Chile,  and  bringing  back  cargoes  of  copper  ore  in 
bulk.  "We  would  put  up  the  shoes  in  nice  little  cases,  twenty- 
four  pairs  in  a  case.^  The  cases  were  bound  with  iron  straps. 
Hemenway  said  he  could  put  two  cases  on  to  a  mule's  back  and 
send  them  three  or  four  hundred  miles  over  the  mountains.  He 
kept  his  trade  so  private  that  he  did  not  allow  us  to  tell  any  one 
he  bought  shoes  of  us.    He  would  send  them  aboard  the  vessel 

'  Br>'ant,  p.  39.  2  jj^jd,^  pp.  28-29. 

^  Ibid.:  Shoe  and  Leather  Trade  of  the  last  hundred  years,  pp.  28,  114. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  63 

after  dark  for  fear  other  people  would  find  out  he  was  shipping 
shoes  and  he  was  just  as  private  with  other  goods.  He  kept  a  gang 
of  men  loading  the  ship  all  night.  The  last  bill  of  goods  I  sold 
him  amounted  to  about  $20,000  which  I  had  his  check  for." 

Altogether  Bryant's  picture  of  the  markets  and  jobbers  of  the 
southern  wholesale  trade  makes  the  research  worker  understand 
better  the  market  conditions  and  expectations  under  which  the 
shoe  manufacturers  of  Massachusetts  were  producing  and  getting 
their  successful  markets  in  the  twenties  and  early  thirties  before 
the  Panic  of  1837.  All  the  export  trade  was  full,  evidently,  of 
allurement  and  hopes.  Some  brought  too  great  risk  and  no  profit. 
Bryant  tells  of  the  successful  ventures.  One  can  imagine  many 
unchronicled  failures  from  overreaching  in  distant  markets  and 
unwise  investments  of  capital,  while  others,  like  the  E.  and  T. 
Batcheller,  and  the  Mitchell  and  Bryant  firms,  held  to  their 
course  with  success. 

The  Second  Phase  of  the  Domestic  Period  Closes  in  Panic 

of  1837 

Prosperity  in  and  through  the  boot  and  shoe  trade  in  Massa- 
chusetts towns  was  general  in  1837.  Not  only  individual  shoe 
merchants  were  in  the  speculating,  expanding  mood;  whole  shoe 
towns  were  also.  Lynn  built  forty-two  new  streets  between  1831 
and  1840.  Just  as  Weymouth  had  needed  a  bank  to  help  its  shoe 
business,  so  Lynn  had  felt  and  met  the  need.  The  Lynn  Mechan- 
ics Bank  was  incorporated  in  1814,  a  savings  bank  in  1826,  and 
the  Nahant  Bank  in  1832,  each  with  a  capital  of  $150,000.  Thus 
the  shoe  entrepreneurs,  oftentimes  the  leaders  in  local  progress 
and  policies,  had  other  problems  than  those  of  credit  and  mar- 
kets, investments  and  tariff  protection.'  They  had  to  help  in 
town  expansion. 

Unfortunately  not  only  town  building  on  a  larger  scale,  but 
the  wonderful  expansion  of  the  shoe  industry  also,  was  to  re- 

'  In  1816  the  duty  on  boots  was  advanced  to  $1.50  a  pair.  In  1824  this  amount 
was  put  on  laced  boots  or  "bootees"  and  a  tax  of  25  cents  a  pair  put  on  prunella 
or  other  shoes  and  slippers.  No  reduction  was  made  in  these  heavy  protective 
rates  until  1842. 


64        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

ceive  a  check  amounting  oftentimes  to  complete  disaster  in  the 
country- wide  financial  crisis  of  1837.  The  large  fortunes  and  the 
market  as  well  came  to  a  sudden  end  in  the  panic  years  of  1837- 
38.  The  money  tied  up  in  land  investments  could  not  be  released 
in  time  to  tide  over  the  epidemic  of  failures.  Then  the  Massa- 
chusetts Bankruptcy  Law,  by  relieving  debtors,  settled  the  nicely 
poised  fate  of  their  braver,  more  far-sighted  creditors.  Many 
more  manufacturing  shoemakers  had  to  fail.  As  a  rule,  the  men 
who  had  smaller  trade  and  smaller  risks  ''held  on"  grimly,  to  be- 
come the  backbone  of  a  new  phase  of  the  Domestic  System. 


CHAPTER  IV 

DOMESTIC  STAGE.    PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM,  i76c^-i855 

Phase  3i  1837-1855 

Regaining  of  capital  and  of  markets. 

Growth  of  distinct  boot  and  shoe  centres. 

Entrepreneur  in  boot  and  shoe  manufacture  makes  that  industry  his  sole  business 
and  not  a  side  venture. 

Capital  turned  over  more  rapidly  and  aided  by  opening  of  banks  for  discounts 
and  loans. 

Henry  Wilson  as  a  tj^^e  of  entrepreneur  using  small  but  active  capital. 

Eddy  and  Leach  as  a  type  of  firm  composed  of  a  shoemaker  allied  with  a  capital- 
ist, because  competition  of  manufacturers  demanded  expert  inspection  of  product. 

New  styles  and  a  greater  variety  of  shoes  made  in  order  to  secure  new  markets 
and  new  classes  of  trade.   Lynn  leads  on  women's  shoes  —  specialization. 

Inventions  and  devices  in  Lynn  and  elsewhere  to  secure  standardization  of 
product  and  to  economize  time. 

Rise  of  markets  for  boots.  The  Howard  and  French  manufactory  for  boots, 
typical  (i)  of  new  variety  of  processes;  of  increase  of  styles  and  sizes,  and  in  use  of 
an  agent  for  collecting  and  placing  work  among  domestic  workers;  (2)  of  increasing 
degree  of  work  done  in  Central  Shop  under  supervision;  and  (3)  of  allied  industries 
in  order  to  use  by-products,  and  to  economize  labor. 

Summary  of  the  Third  Phase  of  the  Domestic  Stage  in  the  Boot  and  Shoe 
Industry. 

Domestic  Period  —  Phase  3 

Revival  of  Shoe  Industry  after  Panic  of  18 jy 

For  the  relatively  few  boot  and  shoe  manufacturers  who  sur- 
vived financially  the  panic  of  1837,  there  was  a  strong  probability 
of  holding  their  old  markets  at  their  own  terms,  because  so  few 
competitors  were  left.  For  many  of  the  shoe  merchants  who  had 
to  fail,  there  was  hope  that  their  old  knowledge,  skill,  and  reputa- 
tion might  help  them  to  regain  and  hold  their  old  customers  if 
they  could  get  capital  enough  in  this  era  of  general  depression  and 
financial  hesitancy  to  start  their  business  again. 

For  new  shoe  manufacturers,  tempted  into  the  field  by  the 
reports  of  its  "big  profits"  prior  to  1837,  in  the  hope  of  gaining 
the  markets  left  open  by  the  failure  of  other  manufacturers,  there 

65 


66        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

was  a  good  chance.  People  had  to  wear  boots  and  shoes  and  there 
was  wealth  in  the  country,  even  if  undue  expansion  of  credit  and 
investment  had  brought  temporary  depression  and  stagnation. 
Since  the  saying  was  as  true  then  as  ever  that  a  merchant  who 
has  a  market  can  secure  capital,  the  vital  thing  for  all  would-be 
boot  and  shoe  manufacturers,  whether  new  or  old  in  the  business, 
was  to  secure  markets,  and  by  1840  a  new  trade  with  new  markets 
was  gradually  emerging  from  the  old  shoe  towns.  There  was  a 
growth  of  distinct  boot  and  shoe  centres,  and  a  new  type  of 
entrepreneurs. 

Growth  of  Distinct  Boot  and  Shoe  Centres 

After  1837,  the  investing  of  capital  in  boot  and  shoemaking 
does  not  seem  to  have  been  a  mere  chance  stroke  of  a  sporadic 
entrepreneur.  Even  before  1837,  it  was  a  policy  or  custom  for  the 
business  men  of  only  certain  localities  to  invest  a  relatively  large 
amount  of  their  capital  in  boot  and  shoe  manufacture,  and  to 
employ  a  large  proportion  of  the  inhabitants,  men,  women,  and 
children,  in  the  manufacture  of  shoes.  The  table  given  in  Ap- 
pendix XVIII,  compiled  from  facts  and  figures  gathered  in  1837- 
38  and  given  in  Barber's  ^  Historical  Collections  of  Massachusetts, 
shows  these  proportions,  and  also  the  distribution  of  the  shoe 
manufacture  throughout  the  counties  and  towns  of  Massa- 
chusetts. 

Localities  in  Massachusetts  Adapted  and  Devoted  to  the  Boot  and 

Shoe  Industry 

Analysis  by  Counties.  We  have  figures  and  facts  also  for  the 
output  of  all  other  industries  in  Massachusetts  in  1837.  -^  study 
of  them  throws  light  on  the  question  why,  in  certain  localities,  the 
boot  and  shoe  manufacture,  instead  of  the  woolen  and  iron  manu- 
facture, attracted  capital.  The  fertile  soil  of  some  counties,^  made 
farming,  with  wool  growing,  the  most  productive  industry.  In  the 

'  Barber  seems  to  have  been  an  indefatigable  research  student,  gathering 
statistics  at  first  hand  in  an  age  when  people  were  beginning  to  demand  and  ap- 
preciate them,  though  the  Government  was  not  collecting  and  publishing  them. 
He  went  from  town  to  town,  it  is  said,  and  personally  gathered  his  figures  and  facts. 

*  E.  g.,  Berkshire,  Hampshire,  Hampden,  and  Franklin. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  67 

case  of  oth^r  counties/  it  is  obvious  why  the  population  was  em- 
ployed in  fishing,  shipping,  shipbuilding,  salt  making,  marketing 
sperm  oil,  or  running  iron  furnaces.  This  was  determined  by  their 
geographical  position  and  their  mineral  deposits.  Hat  making 
had  a  firm  hold  and  made  a  large  output  in  several  counties  and 
tool  making  seems  as  general.^  Worcester  County  which  might 
easily  have  devoted  itself  as  far  as  natural  conditions  were  con- 
cerned to  farming  and  grazing,  and  Essex,  which  was  on  its  water 
line  a  fishing,  shipbuilding  and  shipping  community,  were  devot- 
ing the  larger  share  of  their  capital  and  labor  to  boot  and  shoe 
making.  The  other  counties  devoted  to  the  manufacture  of  boots 
and  shoes  were  Norfolk  and  Plymouth.  They  were  not  so  well 
fitted  for  productive  farming  or  grazing,  and  never  went  so  far 
into  the  woolen  and  cotton  industry  as  the  western  counties  and 
the  Middlesex  towns  did.  Absolute  nearness  or  relative  proximity 
through  transportation  and  banking  facilities  to  Boston  must 
have  made  a  very  great  difference  in  determining  the  choice  of 
industry. 

A  study  of  the  grouping  ^  of  towns  as  well  as  the  natural  re- 
sources of  the  counties  and  the  respective  towns  leads  to  the  con- 
clusion that  custom  and  the  easy  course  of  imitation  were  also 
factors  in  determining  where  capital  as  well  as  labor  should  be 
directed  in  Massachusetts.  In  short,  the  boot  and  shoe  centres, 
according  to  the  analysis  of  such  statistics  as  are  available,  were 
generally  in  the  vicinity  of  large  tanneries  and  in  regions  near 
enough  to  Boston  to  enjoy  banking  and  transportation  facilities 

'  E.  g.,  Bristol,  Barnstable,  Dukes,  Essex  —  having  long  coast  lines. 

^  Local  demand  shows  itself  in  the  large  manufacture  of  scythe  snaths  in  the 
Western  counties,  shovels  in  the  Middle,  and  shoe  tools  in  the  Eastern  countips. 
In  Brockton  (Plymouth  County)  the  manufacture  of  boots  and  shoes  was  a  very 
important,  though  not  the  most  prominent  business  of  the  town.  The  old  iron  in- 
dustry was  leading  naturally  into  tool  making  for  the  farmer  and  the  shoemaker  by 
1835.  In  1836,  Chandler  Sprague  was  making  lasts  and  boot  trees,  having  pur- 
chased the  right  of  using  Thomas  Blanchard's  machine  for  turning  irregular  forms. 
Ten  years  later  a  long  line  of  shoemakers'  tools  and  devices  were  credited  to  the 
toolmakers  of  North  Bridgewater.  Even  in  1835,  North  Bridgewater  was  more 
noted  for  the  tools  which  it  manufactured  than  for  the  product  of  the  tools,  1.  e., 
pegged  brogans.  It  undoubtedly  supplied  the  neighboring  shoemakers  for  miles 
around  with  their  tools. 

*  See  Appendix  XVIII  for  a  summary  of  natural  resources  and  products. 


68        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

as  well  as  Boston  markets.  If  a  man  wished  to  inve?t  in  woolen 
and  cotton  mills,  he  went  to  Hampshire  County  or  to  Bristol;  if 
in  shovels  and  iron  manufacture,  he  went  to  Bristol  or  to  adjacent 
parts  of  Plymouth  and  Norfolk  Counties;  if  in  paper  mills,  he 
went  to  the  middle  counties  of  the  state;  if  in  straw  hats,  then  to 
the  middle  counties  or  to  Bristol  and  Worcester;  if  in  shoes  and 
boots,  he  went  to  Worcester,  Essex,  Plymouth  or  Norfolk  Coun- 
ties —  already  known  far  and  wide  as  the  boot  and  shoe  centres. 

Entrepreneurs  Make  Boot  and  Shoe  Manufacture  their  Main 
Interest  and  not  a  Side  Venture 

Generally  the  capital  for  boot  and  shoe  men  after  1837,  and  the 
two  or  three  years  of  strain,  survival,  and  revival  which  followed 
the  panic  years  of  1837-39,  was  no  longer  the  ''safely  "  reinvested 
savings  of  successful  master-shoemakers  and  the  hoarded  savings 
of  domestic  workers  who  added  thereto  the  savings  from  sales  of 
their  extra  farm  produce ;  it  was  of tener  capital  hired  by  entrepre- 
neurs to  secure  the  largest  or  the  surest  profits  possible.  If  the 
venture  was  more  likely  to  succeed  in  one  town  and  county  than 
another,  the  capital  to  be  invested  in  the  boot  and  shoe  manu- 
facture would  be  attracted  there.  The  shoe  business  in  1837  to 
1855  and  the  whole  Factory  Period  which  followed  was  not  the 
outgrowth  of  village  cobbler  shops  and  "  spare- time-spare-savings 
work  for  venture  in  export  trade"  as  in  1810-37;  it  represented 
systematic  and  critical  investment  in  seemingly  lucrative  busi- 
ness that  would  pay  interest  on  the  borrowed  capital  and  yield 
considerable  profits,  not  a  mere  livelihood  or  an  extra  source  of 
profit  to  a  merchant.  The  use  of  notes  and  the  rapid  turning  over 
of  capital  suggested  and  made  a  demand  for  banking  facilities. 

Henry  Wilson-'s  Account  Book  for  1846 

Henry  Wilson  of  Natick  was  an  entrepreneur  of  this  new  type. 
His  account  book^  shows  that  he  was  turning  over  capital  rapidly, 
aided  by  the  use  of  banks  for  discounts  and  loans.  His  account 
book  for  the  year  1846  is  thoroughly  satisfactory  for  giving  an 

*  This  account  book  is  owned  by  Henry  Wilson's  nephew,  Mr.  Louis  Coolidge, 
treasurer  of  the  United  Shoe  Machinery  Company  of  Boston,  Mass. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  69 

adequate  view  of  operations  on  a  comparatively  small  capital  in  a 
Central  Shop  during  this  third  phase  of  the  Domestic  Period. 
All  the  entries  are  made  in  his  own  handwriting  and  the  pages 
include  a  full  inventory  of  his  personal  property  as  well  as  his  real 
estate  for  1846.  Prices  of  work,  of  stock,  and  of  finished  shoes  are 
given.  The  geographical  distribution  of  the  product  is  deducible 
from  the  lists  of  customers  with  their  addresses,  and  there  is  ap- 
pended to  each  customer's  name  Mr.  Wilson's  opinion  of  his 
financial  standing,  "good,"  "fair,"  "failed."  In  the  latter  case  a 
line  was  drawn  through  the  name.  The  account  of  stock  *  taken 
that  year  reveals  the  custom  of  consigning  boots  and  shoes,  the 
manner  of  payment  on  the  part  of  jobbers.  The  number  and 
wages  of  workers  whether  men  or  women  working  in  the  Central 
Shop  or  at  home,  and  the  amount  they  did  for  Henry  Wilson,  can 
be  compiled  from  this  small  account  book.  Figures  from  its  pages 
seem  to  show  this  boot  and  shoe  entrepreneur's  financial  condition 
at  the  opening  in  1846  to  have  been  good.  He  had  property  to  the 
value  of  $5332.51  more  than  he  was  liable  for.  This  included 
house,  shop,  stock  of  raw  and  manufactured  materials,  personal 
property  and  the  notes  due  him.  He  was  working  with  small 
capital,  using  many  notes  and  turning  over  his  stock  quickly,  yet 
he  did  a  $17,000  business  in  1838.^  His  output  increased  from 
18,000  pair  that  year,  his  first  year  of  manufacturing,  to  58,000 
pair  in  1845;  ^^^  from  employing  18  hands  in  1838  he  raised  the 
number  to  52  in  1845.  ^Y  1847,  he  made  122,000^  pair,  with 
109  hands  working  for  him. 

'  See  Appendix  XIX  for  the  Wilson  papers. 

^  To  a  manufacturer  of  today,  used  to  dealing  in  far  larger  ventures,  Wilson's 
venture  must  seem  like  a  mere  grain  of  sand,  yet  when  one  recalls  that  he  had  been 
bom  a  poor  boy  in  New  Hampshire  in  1812;  was  apprenticed  for  11  years  to  a 
farmer  in  New  Hampshire,  and  started  his  young  manhood  on  a  capital  of  two  oxen 
and  six  sheep  which  the  farmer  gave  him  at  the  close  of  that  term  of  years;  that  he 
had  been  a  poor  school  teacher  in  1837-38  and  had  learned  the  trade  of  shoemaking 
meanwhile  as  a  sort  of  avocation,  he  seems  not  only  successful  and  energetic,  but 
typical  of  many  Massachusetts  shoe  entrepreneurs. 

'  No  explanation  is  given  for  this  sudden  and  single  large  output.  That  of  1846 
was  47,000  pair,  while  the  year  of  1848  had  an  output  of  only  63,000,  and  the 
number  of  hands  decreased  to  68.  A  similar  peculiar  great  advance  in  output  came 
in  Wilson's  town  that  very  same  year.  John  B.  Wolcott  manufactured  100,000  pair 


70        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

The  shoe  which  Henry  Wilson  manufactured  was  a  cheap 
brogan  for  Southern  plantation  slaves,  needing  simply  cutting, 
closing  of  short  seams  on  uppers,  and  lasting,  in  order  to  make 
them  ready  to  ship.  His  customers  were  in  Boston,  Hartford, 
Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  Camden  and  Charleston,  S.  C,  Augusta 
and  Savannah,  Ga.,  Montgomery,  Ala.,  St.  Louis,  and  New 
Orleans. 

A  few  sample  pages  (given  in  Appendix  XIX)  suggest  the 
quantities  in  which  these  men  bought  and  the  prices  they  paid. 
They  show  also  that  brogans  were  being  shipped  by  freight  over 
the  new  Worcester  Railroad,  packed  in  boxes  and  no  longer  in 
casks  or  trunks  as  they  were  in  the  pioneer  days  of  the  southern 
and  western  trade.  The  account  book  pages  show  comparatively 
few  names  of  individual  workers.  In  1846,  six  men  appear  to  be  at 
work  bottoming  or  lasting  brogans  for  Henry  Wilson,  while  eight 
women  were  closing,  i.  e.,  sewing  up  short  seams  of  brogans. 
This  work  was  done  so  often  by  the  young  boys  and  girls  of  the 
family  and  the  pay  collected  by  their  fathers,  that  the  wages  paid 
to  women  and  men  represent  the  pay  for  the  joint  work  of  the 
family.  Besides  the  six  men  who  appeared  as  domestic  workers, 
there  were  agents  who,  as  "freighters,"  came  to  Wilson's  central 
shop  and  took  out  work  to  be  done.  This  they  distributed  in  the 
countryside,  and,  collecting  it  in  due  time,  returned  it  to  Wilson 
and  received  the  lump  pay.  Whether  these  freighters  were  paid  a 
commission  by  the  domestic  workers,  or  a  wage  by  Wilson  for  this 
collecting,  is  not  apparent  in  the  records.  It  was  a  custom  in  very 
general  use  in  the  boot  and  shoe  regions  and  its  inherent  diffi- 
culties will  be  discussed  later  on.  One  entry  shows  a  man  bring- 
ing in  1830  pairs  of  brogans  at  one  time.  The  number  of  domestic 
workers  engaged  upon  this  lot  is  not  recorded.  These  brogans 
represented  perhaps  the  winter's  work  of  two  or  three  men  and  a 
week's  work  of  a  large  number. 

of  brogans  in  1847,  when  in  1846  his  output  was  64,cxx),  and  in  1848  it  had  dropped 
to  84,000.  For  the  next  six  years  it  averaged  100,000  again.  Evidently  new  markets 
had  been  anticipated  and  secured  in  his  case,  while  Wilson  went  out  of  business  into 
political  life. 


DOMESTIC  ST  AGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  7 1 

Competition  of  Manufacturers  demands  Expert  Supervision 

of  Product 

When  Henry  Wilson  ventured  into  the  manufacture  of  bro- 
gans,  he  was  a  shoemaker  by  training  as  well  as  a  capitalist.  He 
could  be  superintendent  of  his  own  shop  as  well  as  seller  of  his 
product.  These  were  the  years  when  capitalists  who  were  not 
shoemakers,  realizing  the  keen  competition  of  such  contem- 
poraries as  Henry  Wilson,  had  the  wisdom  to  take  as  partners 
men  who  knew  the  trade  and  could  put  brains  against  money. 
While  in  old  days,  the  shoemaker-turned-capitalist  could  keep  his 
workers  in  hand  by  very  casual  inspection  or  a  wholesome  fear  of 
it,  because  he  was  known  to  have  learned  the  trade,  the  "out- 
sider," as  capitalist,  could  hope  at  most  to  learn  the  stock,  and 
did  not  try  to  master  the  processes.  If  he  did  not  take  a  real  shoe- 
maker as  a  partner,  he  had  to  trust  entirely  to  expert  workmen, 
foremen  and  agents  who  were  devoted  to  his  interests,  and  let 
them  determine  the  details  of  stock  and  processes,  while  he 
attended  to  markets  and  profits. 

A  typical  case  of  this  was  the  firm  of  Eddy  and  Leach,  in 
Middleboro,  in  southern  Massachusetts  where  there  were  scores 
of  ten-footers.  When  "Deacon  Eddy"  who  owned  the  general 
store  and  ran  the  postoffice  of  the  town,  decided  to  go  into  the 
shoe  business  and  invest  the  $10,000  he  had  previously  made  in 
the  shovel  business,  he  took  for  his  partner  George  Leach,  who 
had  only  $200  to  invest,  but  years  of  experience  as  a  skilled  shoe- 
maker to  add.  Before  this  date,  1852,  in  a  ten-footer  on  his  farm, 
Leach  had  made  up  shoes  taken  out  from  various  central  shops  in 
Middleboro  and  neighboring  shoe  towns,  sometimes  with  the  aid 
of  just  his  own  family,  at  other  times  employing  women  and  men 
in  their  homes.  The  same  22X28  two-story  building  which  had 
served  Deacon  Eddy  for  a  store  '  and  postoffice  was  thereafter 
known  as  the  Eddy-Leach  Manufactory.  The  upper  rooms  were 
used  for  storing  stock  and  finished  goods,  for  cutting  upper  and 

'  This  store  was  in  a  central  spot  where  the  mailcoach  on  its  way  from  Boston  to 
Plymouth  stopped  each  day.  After  the  railroad  linked  up  Plymouth  and  Braintree, 
and  Fall  River  and  Boston  via  Middleboro  and  Stoughton,  the  mailcoach  was  still 
the  link  between  Plymouth  and  Middleboro.  See  map  of  Massachusetts  facing 
page  14. 


72        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

sole  leather,  and  for  inspecting  and  crowning  the  shoes  brought 
back  by  domestic  workers.  Gradually  here  as  elsewhere  a  gang 
to  work  at  bottoming  was  employed.  A  14-foot  ell  was  added  for 
a  stitching  room  in  the  late  50's,  where  Mr.  Leach's  two  sons, 
skilled  shoemakers  in  the  third  generation,^  did  the  stitching  for 
the  firm. 

Specializing  and  Standardizing  the  Products 

Skilled  workmen  who  had  no  capital,  nor  executive  experience 
which  warranted  their  being  taken  into  a  firm,  were  much  in 
demand  if  they  were  trustworthy  and  had  initiative  and  adap- 
tability as  well  as  technical  training.  New  and  more  numerous 
styles,  and  better  workmanship  than  had  previously  been  put  into 
ready-made  shoes,  were  the  order  of  this  new  shoe  period  in  the 
Lynn  region.  High  legged  boots,  never  before  general  in  New 
England  except  in  custom  work,  were  the  new  departure  of  Ran- 
dolph and  the  neighboring  towns  which  became  known  as  boot 
towns. 

The  Massachusetts  towns  which  specialized  in  shoes,  whether 
they  were  cheap  coarse  brogans  or  fine  ladies'  or  cheap  children's 
shoes,  can  be  seen  by  figures  presented  in  the  table  in  Appendix 
XVIIL 

Women's  pegged  and  common  sewed  shoes^  were  manufactured  chiefly  at 
Lynn,  Haverhill,  Worcester,  Milford,  Natick,  Randolph,  Abington,  North 
and  South  Reading,  Danvers,  Georgetown,  Stoughton,  Woburn,  Wey- 
mouth, and  Stoneham.  Boots  were  made  in  each  of  these  towns  except 
Lynn,  but  were  the  leading  article  of  manufacture  in  Haverhill,  MUford, 
Worcester,  North  Brookfield,  Spencer,  Grafton,  Randolph,  Stoughton,^ 
Weymouth,  Abington,  Hopkinton,  and  South  Reading.'' 

^  Cf .  Chap.  VI  for  more  facts  about  the  Leach  shoemakers. 

^  New  York  and  Philadelphia  made  boots  and  shoes  of  finer  quality.  Phila- 
delphia led  on  account  of  large  stocks  of  fine  calf  skins  and  morocco  leather,  and  in 
number  of  its  skilled  German  workmen.  The  annual  sales  of  Philadelphia  were 
about  $15,000,000.     Cf.  U.  S.  Census  of  i860,  p.  Ixxii. 

'  Tucker  Brothers  of  East  Stoughton  generally  made  up  boots  and  shoes  only  on 
definite  orders.  They  had  a  Boston  office  with  samples  to  show  buyers  from  the 
South  and  West,  but  had  no  retail  stores  as  the  Littlefields  did,  until  Mr.  Nathan 
Tucker  went  to  Cincinnati  in  1838  and  sold  boots  and  shoes  made  by  various  manu- 
facturers in  Lynn  and  Randolph.  At  that  time  Westerners  did  not  take  as  fine  a 
grade  of  boot  or  shoe  as  the  Southerners.  This  was  not  so  true  after  the  gold  mines 
opened  up  in  California.  *  Cf.  U.  S.  Census  of  i860,  p.  Ixxii. 


DOMI  STIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  73 

In  short,  mostly  women's  shoes  were  made  in  Essex  County, 
mostly  men's  boots  in  Norfolk  and  Worcester  and  Plymouth 
Counties. 
The  number  of  boots  made  in  Massachusetts 

in  1845  was    3,768,160 
in  1855  was  11,892,329 

The  number  of  shoes  made  in  Massachusetts 

in  1845  was  17,128,411 
in  1855  was  33,174,499 

Brockton  (North  Bridgewater)  had  been  making  both  boots 
and  shoes  in  1837,  with  emphasis  decidedly  on  the  boots.  By 
1855,  the  town  had  become  decidedly  a  shoemaking  centre. 


1837 

184s 

i8ss 

i86s 

Boots 

79,000  pr. 

44,7" 

66,956 

103,066 

Shoes 

22,300  pr. 

11S.476 

694,760 

1,009,700 

Meanwhile,  Randolph,  though  showing  a  clear  tendency  to  go 
from  specializing  in  shoes  to  boots,  still  made  more  shoes  than 
boots. 

1837 '  i8ss 

Boots     200,175        345, 100 
Shoes    470,620        363,300 

Lynn  was  apparently  the  first  to  reorganize  on  the  new  basis  of 
standardization  of  product  and  better  quality.  It  realized  that 
the  market  was  already  making  hints  if  not  demands  as  to  styles, 
instead  of  accepting  quietly  anything  the  shoemaker  provided. 
This  was  a  very  real  change  from  earlier  conditions. 

Need  of  Standardizatimi 

Johnson,  in  his  Sketches  of  Lyrm,-  told  of  the  helter-skelter 
work  done  on  shoes  in  the  booming  days  before  1837:  — 

There  were  probably  more  poor  shoes  made  at  this  period  than  were  ever 
made  in  our  city  before  or  since,  in  the  same  length  of  time.  The  stock  for 
the  most  part  was  better  than  the  workmanship,  and  the  soles  were  generally 
better  than  the  uppers.    The  great  defect  was  a  lack  of  system,  which  ig- 

'  Barber,  Hist.  Coll.  of  Mass.,  p.  482. 

*  Sketches  of  Lynn  or  The  Changes  of  Fifty  Years,  by  David  N.  Johnson,  pp. 
151-152- 


74        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INLUSTRY 

nored  all  the  laws  of  adaptation.  Firm  stout  soles  were  joined  to  uppers  that 
were  evidently  got  up  with  no  reference  to  wear;  and  worse  than  this,  if  both 
were  equally  good  —  as  was  sometimes  the  case  —  they  were  often  spoiled  in 
making  up.  As  an  illustration  of  this,  thousands  of  pairs  of  boots  cut  from 
stout  grained  leather  upper  stock,  and  having  soles  of  the  best  quality,  were 
spoiled  by  the  miserable  expedient  of  using  paper  stifTenings.  When  it  is 
understood  that  this  paper  was  not  the  stout,  compact  leather-board  of  the 
present  day,  but  a  tender  straw-paper  that  a  drop  of  water  would  penetrate 
through  and  through,  no  comment  is  needed  to  demonstrate  the  utter 
worthlessness  of  the  article  when  it  was  ready  for  the  foot  of  the  wearer. 
Nor  was  this  the  only  unscientific  and  wasteful  arrangement.  Shoes  were 
sewed  in  such  a  manner  that  they  dropped  to  pieces  long  before  they  were 
half  worn  out;  and  when  the  sewing  was  good,  the  labor  was  wasted  by  the 
senseless  practice  of  trimming  the  uppers  close  to  the  stitch,  a  practice  ^  that 
made  it  impossible  to  wear  a  pair  of  these  shoes  a  second  time  —  thus 
causing  a  waste  that  could  be  reckoned  by  tens  of  thousands  of  dollars,  if  not 
by  millions. 

Causes  of  Poor  Work  in  the  jo^s  and  of  Improvement  in  the  40' s 

This  lack  of  care  was  not  all  due,  probably,  to  the  feverish 
booming  spirit  which  preceded  the  business  panic  of  1837. 
Other  causes  could  be  enumerated,  such  as  (a)  entrepreneurs 
who  undertook  manufacturing  without  being  shoemakers  and 
were  unable  to  properly  oversee  and  inspect;  (b)  shoeworkers 
who  had  never  been  apprenticed  or  taught  the  trade;  ^  (c)  the 
spirit  of  irresponsibility,  felt  by  new  manufacturers,  had  crept  into 
the  market,  where  if  one  customer  would  not  buy,  others  would, 
and  where  the  buyers  ^  were  competing  instead  of  the  sellers. 

Competition  of  Manufacturers  brings  Improvement  in 
Stock  and  Processes 

After  the  hard  business  strain,  the  shoe  business  gradually  re- 
gained its  old  markets  and  found  new  ones  through  close  com- 
petition among  the  shoe  manufacturing  merchants,  who  had  to 
tempt  and  coax  trade  with  the  same  kind  of  schemes  and  wiles 

'  Would  a  shoemaker  dispute  the  possibility  and  probability  of  this  ? 

-  /.  e.,  the  marginal  producers  hired  to  help  out  in  the  competition  for  workmen 
in  rush  seasons  and  years. 

3  Post-war  conditions  of  the  markets  with  lessened  production  and  increasing 
demands  are  demonstrating  similar  possibilities  today  which  may  serve  to  make 
people  of  1920  understand  conditions  of  1835. 


DOMESTIC  ST  AGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  75 

that  one  uses  with  a  convalescent.  New  ways  of  cutting,  finishing 
and  packing  shoes  appeared.  Laced  shoes  as  well  as  buttoned 
shoes,  and  shoes  laced  on  the  side  instead  of  front,  became  the 
fashion.  A  realization  came  gradually  that  the  custom  shoe- 
maker need  not  be  allowed  to  keep  the  monopoly  of  making  so 
many  shapes  and  sizes  of  shoes  that  all  kinds  of  feet  might  be  well 
fitted.  It  seems  now  as  if  Lynn  shoemakers  realized  fully  for  the 
first  time  in  the  40's  that  all  four  factors  in  shoemaking  needed 
constantly  to  be  taken  into  account.  Not  alone  materials  and 
labor,  but  patterns  and  tools  counted  much  in  adapting  the 
stock  of  shoes  to  a  wide  range  of  customers.  Up  to  this  time, 
Lynn  had  either  followed  the  styles  current  in  England  in  the 
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  or  those  in  the  United 
States  in  the  nineteenth  century.  When  its  Latin-American 
trade  started,  Lynn  suited  the  real  or  supposed  fancies  of  South 
American  and  West  Indian  women  for  bright  colors  and  fancy 
trimmings.  This  was  its  extent  of  adaptation  to  environment 
and  to  the  human  foot.  Cloth  for  uppers,  grained  leather  or  kid 
for  foxing  ^  was  the  rule  for  women's  shoes.  A  rough  grading  as  to 
sizes  and  widths  was  known  to  exist  though  few  pairs  of  three's 
and  few  "fulls"  ^  were  really  mates. 

Tin  Sole  Patterns  for  Sole  Cutting 

Johnson,  the  Lynn  shoemaker-writer  already  quoted,  describes 
in  a  heartfelt  way,  naive  but  savoring  of  real  memories,  the  need 
of  inventions  to  secure  uniformity.  Tin  patterns  for  shaping  soles 
made  uniformity  in  the  shape  of  shanks,  though  they  abridged 
the  independence  of  cutters.  Around  the  shanks  there  had  al- 
ways been  a  "chance  for  the  display  of  original  genius.  A  single 
box  of  shoes,  the  product  of  three  or  four  workmen,  would  display 
as  many  different  styles  of  shanks.  .  .  .  The  question  of  match- 
ing shanks,  when  the  day's  work  was  to  be  tied  up,  imposed  a 
degree  of  responsibility  not  experienced  at  the  present  time.  It 
was  found  that  the  range  taken  in  a  single  day  between  the  two 

'  The  foxing  is  the  extra  or  ornamehtal  surface  of  leather  over  the  upper  of  a 
shoe. 

*  Fulls  were  shoes  cut  to  be  full  over  the  instep. 


76        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

extremes  of  wide  and  narrow  shanks  was  considerable,  some- 
times showing  violent  contrasts."  ^  One  wonders  if  the  change 
y  to  uniformity  here  was  not  primarily  a  move  in  the  interest  of 
time-saving  for  the  manufacturer  rather  than  merely  one  to  re- 
lieve in  the  future  a  retail  shoe  dealer  and  his  "fussy"  customer, 
who  might  want  her  two  shoes  to  match. 

Patterns  for  Uppers 

In  1848,  George  Parrott  applied  a  principle,  already  known  in 
turning  lasts,  to  a  pattern-making  machine  for  uppers.  This 
J  secured  ^  (a)  exactness  in  the  proportion  between  the  several 
sizes;  and  (b)  made  gradual  increase  in  the  fullness  over  the  in- 
step and  around  the  ankle.  This  exactness  was  felt  to  be  neces- 
sary thereafter,  especially  in  the  smaller  sizes  for  women  and  in 
children's  shoes.  The  first  patterns  had  been  made  of  straw 
board  or  some  even  less  enduring  material,  and  each  manu- 
facturer had  cut  his  own  patterns.  Johnson  adds  that  these  "had 
not  been  characterized  by  mechanical  exactness." 

Shoes  beean  in  the  50's  to  be  "crooked  shoes."  Before  that 
they  had  been  "straights"  i.e.,  no  rights  or  lefts,  though  the 
knowledge  of  making  crooked  shoes  had  been  possessed  and 
used  by  ancient  Egyptians,  Greeks,  Romans,  Mediaeval  and 
even  early  modern  shoemakers  as  archaeological  and  printed 
materials  prove. 
Of  course  variation  had  to  be  made  in  both  uppers  and  soles  in 
]  making  crooked  shoes  rather  than  straights,  and  a  new  shoe  manu- 
facturer without  cut-stock  on  hand  was  more  likely  to  adopt  this 
new  style. 

Stripper  and  Sole  Cutter 

Already  two  other  machines  had  been  invented  to  make  sole 
cutting  more  uniform  than  the  tin  patterns  could  keep  them. 
The  stripper,  with  its  heavy  blade  worked  by  foot  power,  cut  the 
sole  leather  into  strips  across  the  width  of  the  side  of  leather,  or 
in  various  widths  corresponding  to  the  length  of  the  sole  re- 
quired. This  gave  exactness  of  length.  The  sole  cutter  itself  which 

1  Johnson:  Sketchesof  Lynn,  pp.  17-18.  '  Ibid.,  p.  20. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  J  J 

gave  regularity  of  shape  and  uniformity  of  width,  was  the  inven- 
tion of  Richard  Richards,  a  Lynn  last  maker  who  patented  it  in 
1844. 

Allied  Industries.     Cut  Leather 

Even  then,  Lynn  ^  was  vitally  interested  in  developing  allied 
industries.  Daniel  Estes  as  early  as  1845  ma'de  a  business  of 
selling  cut  sole  leather,  not  outer  soles,  but  inner  soles  and 
stiffening.  Then  in  answer  to  demands  for  all  grades  of  cut  soles, 
of  good  as  well  as  cheap  stock,  several  other  firms  went  into  the 
business  in  Lynn. 

Shoe  Boxes  and  Cartons 

The  Lynn  shoe  manufacturers  were  among  the  first  to  realize 
that  shoes  were  more  attractive  to  retail  trade  and  reached  it  in 
better  order  when  packed  in  separate  pasteboard  boxes  or  car- 
tons. In  early  days  when  Lynn  shoemakers  had  tramped  to 
Boston  with  venture  shoes  in  bags  slung  over  their  backs,  or  had 
been  fortunate  enough  to  ride  on  horseback  and  carry  the  shoes  in 
saddle-bags,  they  found  no  competing  manufacturers  with  better 
ways  of  handling  goods  for  market.  From  all  the  shoemaking 
towns,  brogans  and  shoes  of  all  sorts  had  generally  been  sent  in  bar- 
rels and  those  sent  to  the  West  Indies  competed  only  with  others 
sent  in  casks  from  England.  Shoe  boxes  had  not  been  generally 
used  until  the  3o's.2  It  was  in  1836  that  shoe-box  making  on  a 
large  scale  was  estabhshed  in  Lynn  by  James  Buft'um,  following 
up  the  success  made  by  Benjamin  Mudge  and  EHja  Downing, 
who  began  as  early  as  1825.  It  was  at  the  end  of  this  decade  of 
the  30's  that  paper  shoe  boxes  were  put  on  the  market  by  Abner 
Jones  of  Lynn.  Very  few  more  were  made  before  1850,  when 
George  Cushman  set  up  in  the  business,  which  proved  a  good  one, 

'  Lynn  and  Brockton  today  are  as  famous  for  the  allied  industries  of  shoe  manu- 
facture from  last  making  machines  to  rands,  stays,  and  patterns,  as  for  their  tre- 
mendous output  of  shoes.  Even  by  1880,  it  was  said  in  Lynn,  "The  trade  of  our 
city  in  cut  leather  reaches  all  over  the  country,  and  it  is  estimated  that  from  one- 
third  to  one-half  of  the  entire  product  is  sold  to  dealers  in  other  places."  Johnson: 
Sketches  of  Lynn,  p.  353. 

*  Accounts  in  Appendix  X\'II  tell  of  the  Batchellers'  paying  for  boxes,  but  prob- 
ably wooden  outer  cases,  not  cartons,  in  1830-34.  Cf.Ch.  Ill  for  frequent  mention  of 
the  use  of  trunks  and  casks  and  sugar  barrels  for  packing  shoes  for  transportation. 


78        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

continuing  all  through  the  50's,  for  then  the  practice  of  "double 
packing"  of  fine  shoes  had  become  general.  The  nicer  the  shoe, 
the  greater  the  care  taken  in  making  and  getting  it  to  market  since 
the  stock  and  workmanship  once  put  in  were  too  valuable  to  be 
marred  by  carelessness.  When  the  treeing  and  finishing  had  been 
done  in  the  central  shop,  the  stock  was  thereafter  kept  under  care- 
ful conditions  even  in  transportation,  and  proper  precautions 
against  dampness  that  might  produce  mould  were  deemed  an 
essential  part  of  plans  for  shipment. 

Linking  up  of  Inventions  to  Develop  the  Shoe  Industry 

It  is  worth  while  to  follow  thus  in  detail  this  development  of 
svstem  and  uniformity  in  the  line  of  specialization  and  standardi- 
zation of  the  shoe  product  in  L}'nn,  because  that  product  was 
[a)  necessarily  finer  in  stock  and  workmanship  in  women's  and 
children's  shoes  and  slippers;  and  (h^  was  known  to  wider  mar- 
kets earlier  than  the  output  of  footwear  in  any  other  part  of 
Massachusetts.  It  seems  to  have  led  always,  either  because  of  the 
high  standard  set  by  John  Dagyr  in  1750,  or  because  of  this  very 
characteristic  of  speciaUzing  in  footwear  for  smaller  and  more 
tender  feet.  Lynn's  early  and  superior  technical  advance  seems 
to  have  been  due  to  two  factors:  (i)  the  nature  of  its  product's 
demands;  and  (2)  the  competition  among  its  own  manufacturers 
who  had  a  large  amount  of  creative  power  ^  along  mechanical 
lines.  It  is  no  sporadic  happening  that  made  more  shoe  machine 
inventions  on  Lynn's  borders  even  back  in  the  40's  and  50's  than 
anywhere  else,  nor  that  the  first  sewing  machine,  called  the  dry 
thread,  used  on  uppers  in  Massachusetts,  was  installed  in  1852  by 
John  Wooldredge  in  his  Lynn  factory.  He  had  an  expert  come 
from  Philadelphia  to  instruct  the  first  operator,^  and  by  1854, 

'  Lynn  was  even  then  what  Brockton  became  in  the  70's,  a  shoe  city.  They  both 
continue  to  be  such  for  shoemaking  with  all  its  ramifications  into  allied  industries, 
like  pattern  making  and  shoe  machinery,  are  in  the  very  air,  literally  and  figura- 
tively, since  sign  boards  on  high  buildings  greet  the  eye  as  people  come  into  the  city, 
and  every  inhabitant  is  able  to  talk  shoe  manufacture. 

^  By  a  curious  coincidence,  this  Lynn  operator  who  was  destined  to  take  away 
Hannah's  job  of  binding  shoes  (see  Lucy  Larcom's  poem)  was  called  Hannah  also, 
Hannah  Harris. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  79 

Nichols  Connor,  of  Lynn,  invented  a  binder  to  carry  the  galloon 
binding,  doing  it  more  regularly  and  faster  than  the  skilled  hand 
of  any  man  or  woman. 

Tariff  on  Shoes 

Whether  Lynn  influence  at  Washington  had  more  to  do  than 
that  of  other  shoe  centres  in  gaining  protection  in  the  tariff  of 
1842  for  their  product,  is  not  a  matter  of  record,  as  it  was  when 
Eben  Breed  helped  to  secure  certain  favoring  clauses  in  the  tariff 
of  1789.  It  is  noticeable,  however,  that  while  the  tariff  on  men's 
boots  and  bootees  of  leather  fell  to  $1.25  per  pair,^  and  on  men's 
shoes  or  pumps  to  30  cents  per  pair,  that  the  tariff  of  50  cents  on 
women's  boots  and  bootees  of  leather;  of  40  cents  on  children's 
boots  and  double-soled  pumps;  and  of  25  cents  on  women's  shoes 
or  slippers  whether  of  leather,  prunella  or  other  material  except 
silk,  remained  as  it  had  been  in  the  Tariff  of  1824.  One  feels  that 
Lynn  shoe  manufacturers  must  have  helped  on  this  legislation  by 
making  known  their  desires  or  needs  for  protection. 

Organization  of  Shoe  Business  in  1848-jj  shown  in 
Typical  Account  Books 

For  the  progress  made  in  Lynn  as  a  shoe  centre  by  the  close  of 
the  third  phase  (183 7-1 85 5)  of  the  Domestic  Period,  we  have 
interesting  documentary  evidence.  By  good  fortune,  the  Histori- 
cal Society  of  Lynn  has  in  its  keeping  some  of  the  account  books 
of  Christopher  Robinson  and  Co.  for  1845  and  1855.  Robinson 
had  built  a  factory  of  brick  on  South  Commons  Street  in  Lyrm  in 
1848,  and  his  business,  though  small,  was  typical  for  the  time  and 
place.  We  have  his  note  book,  showing  details  of  organization  in 
the  shoe  business  in  1848.^  One  realizes  from  these  pages  how  few 
machines  were  then  considered  necessary  for  shoemaking;  how 
small  an  amount  of  capital  was  needed  to  equip  a  Central  Shop 
as  late  as  1854;'  yet  with  such  equipment,  Robinson  and  Co. 

'  This  was  25  cents  less  than  in  the  earlier  tariffs  of  1816  and  1824. 

*  See  Appendix  XX. 

'  See  Appendix  XX;    account  of  stock  taken  by  Robinson  and  Company  in 

1854. 


8o        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

were  furnishing  goods  to  customers  widely  scattered  over  the 
country.^ 

Natick  Specializing  in  Brogans,  in  1855 

Though  Natick  was  not  yet,  in  1855,  the  shoe  town  that  it  came 
to  be  in  the  last  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  its  shoe  manu- 
facture far  outran,  in  value  and  in  number  of  workers,  that  of 
any  other  industry  in  the  town.  Some  further  remarks  of  a  local 
historian^  in  1855  give  an  insight  to  the  progress  made  in  Natick 
shoe  manufacture  as  far  as  the  division  of  labor  and  introduction 
of  machinery  were  concerned. 

The  purchase  of  leather,  selling  of  shoes,  and  preparation  of  them  for 
market  are  now  the  work  of  the  manufacturer.  The  cutting,  lining,  packing 
of  the  upper  leather,  belong  to  another  class  of  hands;  of  the  sole  leather  to 
another;  pegging  is  done  either  by  machinery^  or  boys:  lasting  and  trim- 
ming *  by  journeymen;  binding  and  stitching  by  girls  or  by  machinery,  while 
poUshing  the  tops  and  soles  furnishes  employment  for  two  other  sets  of 
hands. 

Making  the  boxes  in  which  the  shoes  are  packed  is  another  branch  of  the 
shoe  business  which  affords  employment  for  many  hands. 

The  only  part  of  this  labor  on  shoes  done  regularly  outside  the 
central  shop  or  manufactory  was  the  binding  and  stitching  when 
it  was  done  by  girls.  The  lasting  and  edge  trimming  was  done 
by  men  working  in  gangs  either  inside  the  shop  or  outside  in  ten- 
footers. 

^  A  partial  list  of  customers  in  1855  is  the  following: 

Wheelock  and  Daniels,  N.  Y.  Grannis  and  Stewart,  Albany,  N.  Y. 

D.  R.  Hubbard,  Rochester,  N.  Y.  Chas.  Ramsdell,  Buffalo,  N.  Y. 

Stephen  Oliver,  Lynn,  Mass.  Cornelius  Sweetzer  and  Co.,  Saco,  Maine. 

John  J.  Ashby,  Salem,  Mass.  Talbot  and  Cunningham,  Providence,  R.  I. 

Charles  Coburn,  Boston,  Mass.  Ira  Cheney,  Durham,  N.  H. 

.    A.  M.  Haines,  Galena,  111.  Potter  and  Phillips,  Davenport,  Iowa. 

White  and  Page,  Richmond,  Va.  Hendrick  and  Markley,  Madison,  Ind. 
Rufus  Elmer,  Springfield,  Mass. 

^  Bacon  was  a  lawyer  of  Natick,  writing  this  history  of  the  town.  Cf.  History 
of  Natick,  p.  152. 

^  The  pegging  machine  had  been  invented  in  1818  and  put  quite  generally  in  use 
for  brogans  and  cheap  boots  and  shoes.  Mr.  Stephen  Belcher  of  South  Randolph 
saw  pegged  boots  for  the  first  time  in  1827.  In  1832  James  Hall  of  North  Bridge- 
water  invented  a  machine  for  pointing  pegs. 

*  Trimming  means  cutting  and  smoothing  of  edges  of  soles  and  heels. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  8 1 

All  this  development  of  Natick's  shoe  manufacture  had  come 
within  the  single  third  phase  of  the  Domestic  Period,  roughly 
dated  from  1837  to  1855.  When  Natick  entrepreneurs  began  the 
first  manufacture  of  ready-made  shoes  (i)  the  use  of  a  central 
shop,  where  storing,  cutting,  and  inspecting  was  done;  and  (2) 
division  of  labor  or  specialization  in  processes,  were  already  cus- 
tomary factors  in  shoe  manufacture.  A  coarse  shoe,  either  a  plow 
shoe  or  a  brogan,  was  Natick's  one  specialty  all  through  this 
period,  and  all  the  figures  show  the  price  to  average  one  dollar.* 

Rise  and  Development  of  the  Boot  Manufacture  for 
Special  Markets  — 1837-1855 

Just  as  Lynn  and  its  neighboring  towns  in  Essex  County 
specialized  in  the  manufacture  of  women's  shoes  bringing  them 
to  a  higher  standard  by  using  far  greater  uniformity  of  technique; 
and  as  Brookfield  with  its  Worcester  County  neighbors,  and 
Natick  with  its  Middlesex  County  towns  kept  to  the  manufacture 
of  brogans  in  the  40's  and  50's;  so  Randolph  and  many  of  her  Nor- 
folk County  neighbors  specialized  in  boots  after  the  opening  of 
the  4o's,2  though  previous  to  that,  figures  show  the  preponder- 
ance of  shoes,  mostly  brogans.  By  1855,  Randolph  was  as  well 
known  as  the  producer  of  high  class  boots  ^  for  California,  Aus- 
tralia, and  Texas  trade,  as  New  Bedford  was  for  whalers'  pumps; 
Raynham  for  its  sailors'  pumps  for  Cuba,  its  Balmorals  for  white 
artisans,  and  its  plow  boots  for  Western  farmers.  This  whole  de- 
velopment of  specialties  seems  to  have  come  mainly  from  the  keen 
competition  of  producers  for  markets  after  the  hard  times  of 
1837,  which,  as  has  been  said,  had  to  be  coaxed  and  exactly 
suited.  The  first  boots,  i.  e.,  long  legged  boots  with  sewed  hea\y 
soles,  had  been  made  in  Randolph  about  1830.  By  1837,  one  old 
shoemaker  told  me,  "plenty  were  being  made."  The  examination 

*  See  Appendix  XXI. 

2  Though  this  specialty  was  confirmed  in  its  youth  by  the  large  demand  from 
Australia  and  California,  it  had  been  born  before  that  time  and  thus  was  ready  for 
vigorous  growth  when  that  demand  came  with  the  advent  in  California  of  former- 
Randolph  bootmakers  who  became  gold  seekers. 

'  The  word  "boots"  here  is  meant  for  high  legged,  heavy  leather  boots,  in  con- 
trast to  low  shoes  or  the  ordinary  boots  of  today. 


82        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

of  the  account  books  bears  this  statement  out  if  we  do  not  think 
of  "plenty"  as  "the  majority."  Statistics  show  that  200,175 
pairs  of  boots  and  470,620  pairs  of  shoes  were  made  in  Randolph 
in  1837.  Here  was  a  substantial  beginning  for  the  development  of 
the  boot  specializing  after  1837  when  specializing  meant  success. 

The  Different  Class  of  Customers  Wearing  Ready-Made  or 
^^  Store  Shoes'' '  Called  for  Specialization 

The  Randolph  boots  were  never  intended  to  take  the  place 
of  the  cheap  brogans  or  plow  shoes,  but  of  the  custom-made  top 
boots  that  had  never  been  entirely  out  of  use  or  style. 

Curiously  enough,  it  was  the  expansion  to  the  West  and  the 
new  frontier  ^  that  made  the  market  and  demand  for  the  new 
kinds  of  boots  and  the  better  processes  which  manufacturers 
produced  after  the  opening  of  the  40's.  From  the  custom  boot- 
makers in  any  large  city  like  Boston,  New  York,  Philadelphia, 
Baltimore,  Richmond,  Charleston,  Savannah,  Mobile,  or  New 
Orleans,  all  the  rich  and  well-to-do  men  of  the  states  north  and 
south  had  ordered  their  own  boots  as  a  matter  of  course.  If  they 
were  Southerners,  they  bought  cheaply  made  brogans  by  the 
hundreds  for  their  slaves;  if  Northerners,  they  expected  to  see 
farmers  and  hired  help  in  the  fields  and  shops  and  their  own  grow- 
ing boys  all  wearing  rough  brogans  or  plow  shoes.  For  them- 
selves, they  said  they  had  to  have  shoes  or  boots  made  to  order  to 
get  anything  to  fit  or  to  be  comfortable.  These  same  men  on  the 
frontier,  Hving  away  from  access  to  the  cities  on  the  Eastern  sea- 
board, had  to  get  along  without  having  new  custom-shoes  made 
for  them.  The  young  cities  of  the  West  would  hardly  have  been 
remunerative  places  for  custom  shoemakers;  a  drummer  or  agent ^ 

^  Chicago,  in  1840,  had  less  than  5000  inhabitants;  St.  Louis  in  1840  had  more 
than  16,000;  Cincinnati  grew  from  24,831  in  1830  to  46,338  by  1840.  Detroit  grew 
from  2200  people  in  1830  to  over  9000  in  1840.  Columbus  had  but  6000  in  1840. 
The  Southern  cities,  however,  were  already  large,  for  New  Orleans  had  46,000  in- 
habitants in  1830  and  Richmond  had  16,000.  Baltimore,  one  of  the  chief  flour 
markets  in  the  country,  had  a  population  of  102,313,  and  Mobile  had  12,672  in  1840. 

'  See  page  58  about  the  Brookfield  firm  of  Deming  and  Edwards,  with  their 
estabhshed  agent  at  Mobile.     Nathan  Tucker  of  East  Stoughton,  Massachusetts 


DOMESTIC  ST  AGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  83 

with  a  line  of  ready-made  boots  and  shoes  from  one  of  the  East- 
ern States  was  much  more  Hkely  to  meet  demands.  When  these 
drummers  came  they  saw  chances  for  different  grades  of  work- 
manship and  better  grades  of  stock.  If  their  home  firms  could 
make  a  satisfactory  boot,  though  not  on  the  individual  customer's 
last  but  with  the  same  style  of  workmanship  and  stock  as  the  new 
man  in  the  West  would  have  ordered  in  a  custom  shop  in  the 
East,  their  firms  might  create  and  hold  a  new  market. 

Howard  and  French  as  Typical  Manufacturers  of  Boots 

in  Randolph 

The  pages  of  account  books  for  the  firm  of  Howard  and  French, 
in  Randolph,  reveal  the  technical  progress  and  the  increase  of 
variety  in  stock,  sizes,  and  workmanship  that  came  in  the  40's. 
Before  their  CaHfornian  and  Australian  trade  began,  they  de- 
veloped a  local  Massachusetts  trade  which  was  in  the  hands  of 
their  agent,  Amasa  Clark,  and  the  account '  of  stock  sold  thiough 
him  gives  not  only  the  variety  of  stock,  but  the  range  of  wholesale 
prices.  He  had  a  regular  route  down  in  the  Lynn-Haverhill  dis- 
trict, where  men's  boots  and  shoes  were  not  commonly  made.  He 
sold  these  customers  large  bills  of  goods  and  his  dealings  were 
mostly  with  jobbers  or  general  store  keepers,  for  he  practically 
always  sold  a  dozen  pairs  of  each  kind  at  a  time.  Single  pairs,  or 
signs  of  retail  sales  were  rare  exceptions  after  1845.  Clark  col- 
lected payment  in  the  form  of  notes,  and  occasionally  in  cash, 
from  the  customers.  Entries  ^  in  the  books  crediting  him  with 
turning  over  much  money  give  us  an  idea  of  the  relative  impor- 
tance of  his  work. 

When  Amasa  Clark  was  at  home  in  Randolph,  he  used  his 
horse  and  wagon  for  taking  out  stock  to  domestic  workers  and 

went  into  the  boot  and  shoe  manufacture  in  1836  with  his  brothers,  who  were 
already  in  business  there.  The  customers,  mainly  in  the  South,  along  the  seaboard 
and  in  New  Orleans,  were  taking  a  high-grade  boot.  In  i8j8  the  Tuckers  started  a 
retail  store  in  Cincinnati,  where  Nathan  Tucker  sold  the  shoes  and  boots  of  vari- 
ous manufacturers  in  Lynn,  Randolph,  and  East  Stoughton.  Before  that,  the 
firm  generally  made  up  definite  orders  only,  and  in  the  Boston  oflice  they  kept 
samples  to  show  the  buyers  who  came  from  the  South  and  West. 
•  See  Appendi.x  XXII.  *  Ibid. 


84        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

bringing  it  back  completed.  All  Liberty  Street  ^  bootmakers  de- 
pended on  this  means  of  transportation  for  their  stock  and 
finished  product,  and  Howard  and  French  were  saved  the  delays 
by  which  other  firms  suffered  and  lost.  Mr.  Clark's  own  interest 
in  getting  stock  ready  for  his  trip  down  to  Lynn  probably  made 
him  just  the  right  person  to  go  in  and  out  among  the  workers,  for 
he  thus  acted  as  a  sort  of  unofficial  foreman  in  "getting  the  run" 
through.  This  was  necessary,  for  the  irregular  number  of  days  of 
work  paid  for  by  Howard  and  French  suggest  the  truth  of  the 
tradition  that  men  took  time  off  for  planting  and  haying,  as  well 
as  for  occasional  fishing  trips. 

Typical  ledger  pages  ^  with  entries  for  the  three  months  from 
January  to  March,  1845,  give  details  of  Howard  and  French's 
customers  and  sales,  which  furnish  a  good  idea  of  the  volume  of 
this  firm's  business,  such  as  the  study  of  Amasa  Clark's  sales  alone 
could  not  give.  Other  pages,  giving  records  of  stock  bought  by 
the  firm,  furnish  other  means  of  realizing  the  volume  of  their 
business.  This  was  small  compared  with  the  Walkover  or  Douglas 
concerns  of  today,  but  large  compared  with  that  of  even  the  late 
30's  in  other  boot  and  shoe  towns. 

Wages.     Truck  System  Survivals 

These  accounts  show  not  only  the  greater  cost  of  the  finer 
grades  of  stock  used  in  the  40's  for  boot  and  shoe  manufacture 
and  the  higher  price  paid  for  boots  by  wholesale  customers,  but 
the  higher  wages  paid  by  manufacturers  for  labor.  Instead  of 
compiling  the  wages,  however,  in  the  gross  for  any  specific  three 
months,  it  would  seem  more  effective  to  take  them  throughout 
ten  years  (1845-55)  to  illustrate  certain  points  such  as  specializa- 
tion, piece  and  weekly  wages,  the  wages  of  men  and  of  women,  of 
skilled  and  ordinary  workers,  of  labor  on  high-priced  and  on  low- 
priced  goods. 

By  way  of  introduction,  there  are  traces  of  the  survivals  of  the 
truck  system  of  paying  wages,  which  was  common  before  1837 

1  See  map,  p.  18.  A  settlement  lying  between  South  Braintree  and  the  junction 
of  Liberty  Street  with  Main  Street,  Randolph,  where  the  Howard  and  French  factory- 
was  located. 

2  See  Appendix  XXII  for  these  pages. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  8  5 

when  banking  facilities  were  scarce  and  inadequate.  The  day  of 
payment  by  orders  on  stores,*  or  truck  wages,  was  nearly  over  for 
Randolph  shoe  workers  by  1845,  for  entries  in  ledgers  show  that 
payments  were  almost  invariably  in  cash.  Only  occasional  men- 
tion is  made  between  1845  and  1855  o^  such  articles  as  butter, 
potatoes,  apples,  and  hay  as  payment.^  As  there  was  already  a 
well  established  bank  in  Randolph  where  notes  could  be  dis- 
counted and  checks  cashed,  the  firm  did  not  have  the  old  excuse 
for  delaying  payment.  The  payments  were  still  made  irregularly, 
ranging  from  $1.75  at  a  time  to  $10.00,  just  as  the  domestic 
workers  on  return  of  boots,  or  the  cutter  in  the  factory,  asked  for 
some  cash.  This  was,  of  course,  long  before  the  time  of  a  weekly 
pay  roll. 

Piece  Work  in  Homes  and  Ten-footers 

Cutting,  treeing,  and  varnishing  were  always  done  in  the  fac- 
tory and  represent  the  work  which  might  be  supervised  directly^ 
by  the  firm,  partly  before  the  stock  was  sent  out  to  domestic 
workers  to  fit  and  make,  partly  after  it  came  back  to  be  "finished" 
by  treeing  and  varnishing,  and  to  be  inspected  and  crowned. 
There  were  meanwhile  scores  and  scores  of  men  and  women 
regularly  employed,  directly  and  indirectly,  by  Howard  and 
French  to  make  and  fit  boots  in  their  homes.  Gideon  Howard, 
who  lived  over  in  South  Randolph,  near  Ebenezer  Belcher's  old 
shop,  took  out  stock  and  brought  back  finished  boots.  He  had  a 
"  gang  "  over  in  his  twelve-footer  who  fitted,  made  and  finished: 
one  lasted,  one  pegged  and  tacked  on  soles,  one  made  fore  edges, 
one  put  on  heels  and  "  pared  them  up,"  and  in  case  of  hand- 

1  The  usual  form  of  orders  on  stores  read:  —  "Please  deliver  to  the  bearer  goods 
to  the  amount  of ."   Dated  and  signed  by  the  manufacturer  or  his  clerk. 

*  Mr.  French  of  the  firm  of  Howard  and  French  had  a  Vermont  farm,  and  prob- 
ably payment  in  farm  produce  was  a  mutual  advantage.  When  Howard  and  French 
began  business  in  1840,  they  had  paid  generally  in  orders  on  the  store  of  French  and 
Spear,  evidently  a  good  sized  general  store.  The  entries  in  the  day  book  for  just 
three  months  show  the  following  wide  range  of  articles  taken  on  orders  in  lieu  of 
cash  wages:  boot-trees,  long  sticks,  sponges,  starch,  shoe  bo.xes,  nails,  grindstone, 
planes,  plank,  canvas,  silesia,  silk,  vest  pattern,  trimmings,  awls  by  the  gross,  paper 
by  the  ream,  fur  hats  and  almanacs,  cashmere,  sheep  skins,  as  well  as  a  lot  of 
second  hand  clothing  valued  at  $15.00.  As  late  as  1855,  two  of  their  workers, 
Nathan  Freeman  and  Elbridge  Jones,  took  part  of  their  pay  in  groceries. 


86        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

sewed  shoes,  two  or  three  sewers  were  needed  to  keep  the  rest  of 
the  gang  busy.  The  "gang"  had  become  a  distinct  factor  in  shoe- 
making.  As  business  grew  larger  in  the  40's  and  the  50's,  the 
demand  was  greater  for  ten-footers  to  replace  kitchen  ells,  and 
for  separate  seats  in  them.  Some  enterprising  men  in  Randolph 
invested  their  capital  in  making  little  shops  to  rent  in  toto  or  by 
the  seat  at  so  much  a  week.  All  the  men  who  worked  in  such  a 
shop  "chipped  in"  to  pay  the  cost  of  the  fire.  These  groups  of 
men  in  a  ten-footer  gradually  took  on  a  character  due  to  spe- 
cialization demanded  by  the  markets  with  higher  standards  and 
need  of  speed  in  output.  Instead  of  all  the  men  working  there 
being  regularly  trained  shoemakers,  perhaps  only  one  would  be, 
and  he  was  a  bos^;  contractor  (not  to  be  confused  with  men  in 
Philadelphia  who  were  called  garret  bosses  and  employed  from 
one  to  twelve  workmen  in  their  own  rooms,  buying  their  stock 
and  selling  their  product  to  jobbers  and  retailers),  who  took  out 
from  a  central  shop  so  many  cases  to  be  done  at  a  certain  figure 
and  date,  and  hired  shoe  workers  who  had  "picked  up"  the 
knowledge  of  one  process  and  set  them  to  work  under  his  super- 
vision. One  of  the  gang  was  a  laster,  another  a  pegger,  one  an 
edgcmaker,  one  a  polisher.  Sometimes,  as  business  grew,  each  of 
these  operators  would  be  duplicated.  Such  work  did  away  with 
the  old  seven-year  apprenticeship  system.  In  this  gang  system 
Hes  the  genesis  of  the  factory,  for  it  has  the  essential  character- 
istics, specialized  work  under  supervision  under  one  roof.  The 
regulation  price  for  fitting,  i.  e.,  putting  on  binding,  siding,  or 
sewing  the  seams  of  uppers,  was  seven  cents  a  pair,  nearly  double 
the  price  paid  for  fitting  brogans.  Ideas  of  the  wages  for  such 
domestic  workers  and  for  shop  workers  can  be  gathered  from  these 
same  Howard  and  French  books. ^  A  diff^erence  in  piece  wages  for 
larger  sized  boots  can  be  traced  after  1847,  3-s  well  as  for  work  on 
finer  grades.  There  are  full  records  of  women's  wages,  as  domestic 
workers.^ 

'  See  Appendix  XXII.  2  /j^^ 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  87 

Working  Days,  Wages  and  Specialties  of  Workmen  in 

Central  Shops 

(a)  Day  Wages.  Although  there  is  no  weekly  pay  roll  to  con- 
sult, a  fairly  accurate  estimate  of  weekly  earnings  of  the  men 
working  in  the  central  shop  can  be  gotten  from  the  ledger  pages. 
Nathan  Freeman  worked  by  the  day  as  cutter  in  the  shop  at  the 
regular  price  of  $1.00  a  day.^  His  wages  amounted  to  $293.50  in 
1854.  Ih  April  of  1855,  his  pay  began  to  be  $1-1/3  ^  day,  and  it 
was  the  same  till  1857.  This  wage  was  paid  mostly  in  cash,  at 
intervals  of  two  or  three  days.  It  was  paid  in  part,  however,  in 
cheese,  flour,  butter  and  leather  stock. 

Elbridge  Jones  was  also  working  by  the  day  at  $1.66-2/3  per 
day  in  1854.  His  record  ^  shows  that  he  worked  about  24^  days 
on  an  average  a  month,  293  days  a  year.  His  wages  in  1854 
amounted  to  $468.34.  This  sum  was  also  paid  partly  in  cash, 
partly  in  dinners  at  the  rate  of  16-2/3  cents  apiece,  in  stock,  in 
butter  and  in  "hay  for  Jones's  horse." 

(b)  Piece  Work  Wage  in  Central  Shop.  In  1855  Sylvanus  Pratt 
was  treeing  in  Howard  and  French's  shop.  It  was  his  specialty 
and  he,  like  the  other  four^  men  employed  there  as  treers,  did  100 
pairs  a  week  on  an  average  for  seven  cents  a  pair  for  regular 
length  boots.  Short-legged  grained  boots  were  easier  to  tree  and 
the  price  was  correspondingly  smaller. 

'  Number  of  days  worked  by  Nathan  Freeman : 

26  in  Jan.    1854.  soj  in  July,  1834. 

24  "  Feb.  25     "  Aug. 

27  "  Mar. 
22   "  Apr. 

25  "  May 
24    '  June 

*  Number  of  days  worked  by  Elbridge  Jones : 

21  in  Jan.    1834.  19    in  July,  1854. 

24  "  Feb.  26     *  Aug. 

25  "  Mar.  23     "  Sept. 

21  "  Apr.  24     "  Oct. 

22  "  May  22     "  Nov. 

26  •  June  26     "  Dec. 

'  Ira  Howard,  Edwin  Howard,  Luther  Rowe  and  Henry  Bangs.  See  Ap- 
pendi.x  XXII.  A  tree  is  a  form  over  which  a  shoe  or  boot  leg  is  cleansed  and 
polished  in  the  factory  just  before  it  is  packed. 


26 

"  Sept. 

24i 

"Oct. 

26 

"  Nov. 

23 

"Dec. 

88        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Luther  Rowe  treed  and  varnished  and  earned  more  than  Pratt 
did  in  any  one  week.  He  was  young  and  vigorous  in  the  50's,  and 
one  of  his  fellow-workmen  has  told  me  that  Luther  always  put  in 
a  "long  day"  when  he  could.  This,  he  explained,  was  their  ex- 
pressign  of  working  as  many  hours  as  there  were  of  daylight  in 
summer  and  winter.  Evidently  the  weeks  when  over  $7.00  was 
earned  contained  some  of  the  "long  days"  of  work,  even  in 
winter  time.^ 

(c)  Cutters  and  Stitchers.  There  was  a  rise  of  wages  for  some 
shop  workers  in  the  later  50's;  Francis  Wayland  Alden  was 
working  by  the  day  in  the  shop,  cutting  at  a 

wage  in  1854       of  $1.00    per  day 
"       "  1855-57   "    1.25      "      « 
"       "1857         "    I-33I    "      " 

Jerome  Fletcher  became  an  expert  stitcher  on  the  wax  thread 
machine  later.  He  worked  at  a  day-wage  until  1859.  In  i860  he 
began  on  piece  work  there  in  the  same  shop.  Records  show  such 
items  as 

257  seams  at          4c $10.28 

64  cases  turned  loc 6.40 

151  seams              4c 6.04 

64  cases  turned  loc 6.40 

{d)  Crimping  or  Forming.  Thomas  Mackedon  was  forming  or 
crimping,  i.  e.,  shaping  the  vamps  or  fronts  of  long-legged  boots. 
This  was  a  dirty,  hard  kind  of  work  and  received  relatively  high 
pay.  "Once  a  crunper  always  a  crimper"  was  true  not  only  of 
one  workman's  Hfe,  but  of  his  sons.   The  stain  on  his  hands  made 

••  Luther  Rowe,  Cr. 

i8ss     By  treeing 

Oct.     6     106  Pr.  Boots  $7.42                Nov.    ly  102  Pr.  Boots  $7.14 

13     100   "        "                   7.00                           24    23  doz.  varnished  1.44 

20      8s   "        "                   5.95                                 100  Pr.  Treed  7.00 

20      8s   "        '                   S-9S                Dec.     I       81   "        "  5.67 

27     108  "        "                   7.56                                     S  doz.  varnished  .31 

Nov.    3      96  "        «                   6.72                           8     108  Pr.  Treed  756 

12  "       "                   .84                      IS    114  "       "  7.98 

10       Q3   "         "                     6.51                             22     117   "         "  8.19 

29     102    "         "  7.14 

Note  uniform  rates  of  7  cents  a  pair  for  treeing,  and  of  6j  cents  a  dozen  pair 

for  varnishing. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  89 

him  appear  a  crimper  every  hour  of  the  week,  even  on  Sunday. 
Mackedon's  shop,  a  ten-footer  on  Union  Street,  was  the  scene  of 
crimping  of  tens  of  thousands  of  boot  legs.^ 

(e)  Special  Work  on  ^' Calif ornians.^'  When  the  Californian 
trade  began,  Howard  and  French  got  their  share  and  paid  even 
higher  prices  for  work  done  on  boots  for  that  special  market. 

1850 

Apr.  II  By  1 2  pr.  Californian  made  $14.00  * 

15  "  "  "  "  «  14.00 

18  "  "  "  "  "  14.00 

24  "  6  "  Long  Sewed    "  4.75 

May  12  "  12  «  "  «  9-50 

12  "  12  "  "  "  9-5° 

Before  that,  the  highest  entry  for  other  workmen  on  "12  pr. 
Californian"  had  been  $10.00.  Amos  Kingman  did  some  of  the 
finest  dress  boots  that  Howard  and  French  manufactured  and 
Jonathan  Wales,  their  agent  in  San  Francisco,  was  glad  to  take 
them,  for  he  sold  them  at  retail  for  $10.00  a  pair. 

March  7,  1849  is  the  first  entry  on  Howard  and  French's  books 
of  this  so-called  Californian,  and  one  is  surprised  to  find  it  so 
early,  yet  it  shows  the  eagerness  with  which  shoe  manufacturers 
were  adapting  themselves  to  new  needs  or  anticipating  possible 
demands  perhaps  by  cleverly  naming  a  style  of  boot  fit  for  the 
original  transcontinental  (a)  counters  journey  of  each  49'er. 

Allied  Industries  and  Economies  of  the  Boot  and  Shoe 

Manufacture 

Not  only  did  labor  have  to  become  more  specialized  and 
efficient  in  this  recuperating  period  of  the  40's  and  in  the  early 

'  Thomas  Mackedon  was  credited  on 

1855 
Jan.  20    By  Forming 

18,900  pr.  boots  to  Jan.  4/55 $850.50 

i.  e.  .04§  a  pr.  price 
1856 
Jan.  14    By  Fonning 

21,  446  Pr.  boots  to  Jan/56  96507 

For  i860,  the  bill  runs  up  to  $1066. 

^  Note  that  "  made  "  here  means  simply  lasting  and  bottoming  at  a  price  of  over  a 
dollar  a  pair. 


90        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

50's,  the  third  and  final  phase  of  the  Domestic  Stage,  but  it  had 
to  be  economized  to  meet  closer  competition.  And  not  only  labor 
but  stock  also  had  to  be  economized  by  the  manufacturers.  These 
two  motives  are  behind  the  buying  of  counters  ^  and  soles  already 
cut.  In  old  days,  workmen  fashioned  counters  and  often  inner- 
soles  from  leather  scraps.  Howard  and  French,  in  1855,  were 
buying  counters  of  N.  M.  Capen,  in  fairly  large  quantities,  e.  g., 
enough  on  September  25  to  provide  for  nearly  1800  pairs  of 
boots. 

There  was  a  Phinney  Company,  in  the  neighboring  town  of 
Stoughton,  making  counters  as  early  as  1845. 

In  1845,  Sylvannus  C.  Phinney  commenced  in  Stoughton  the  manufac- 
ture of  counters  for  boots  and  shoes.  These  are  and  always  have  been  made 
of  leather  by  this  firm.  Previous  to  this,  counters  had  usually  been  cut  out  at 
the  shoe  manufactories  and  were  fashioned  by  some  one  in  the  sole  leather 
room  in  charge  of  that  department.  Mr.  Phinney  appears  to  have  been 
among  the  first  to  realize  that  this  great  industry  was  in  the  future  to  be 
divided  into  many  departments.  So  hard  was  it  to  convince  manufacturers 
of  Massachusetts  that  anything  useful  or  profitable  could  come  of  special- 
ties, that  barely  fifty  sides  of  sole  leather  were  cut  per  week,  that  being  then 
considered  a  very  respectable  and  satisfactory  business.  From  the  small 
beginning  of  2500  sides  of  sole  leather  cut  in  1845,  ^^  1879  it  had  become 
necessary  to  cut  up  90,000  sides. 

(/)  Leather  Shoe  Strings.  It  is  more  than  likely,  however,  that 
the  reluctance  of  the  shoe  manufacturers  to  buy  counters  came 
from  the  feeling  that  there  was  spare  leather  and  labor  in  their 
own  cutting  rooms  to  be  utilized,  but  just  about  the  time  that 
Howard  and  French  began  to  buy  counters,  they  began  also  to 
sell  scrap  leather.  For  this,  J.  Winsor  Pratt  of  Randolph  was  a 
purchaser.  He  had  set  up  in  the  business  of  leather  shoe  string 
making  2  and  by  supplying  him,  Howard  and  French  transformed 

'  A  counter  is  the  stiff  piece  of  leather  around  the  back  of  a  heel  between  the 
lining  and  the  leather  of  vamp. 

^  One  shoe  string  could  be  made  from  about  a  square  inch  of  leather  by  sticking 
an  awl  or  a  knife  point  firmly  through  the  leather  and  a  board  beneath  it,  and  pulling 
the  scrap  slowly  around  to  meet  the  edge  of  another  knife.  Thus  a  27"  string  was  cut 
in  a  spiral  out  of  the  scrap,  which  was  otherwise  waste  except  for  fuel. 


DOMESTIC  STAGE  — PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM 


91 


what  they  had  deemed  a  waste  into  a  by-product.  They  occasion- 
ally bought  strings  of  him  as  the  accounts  show.^ 

Howard  and  French  were  buying  lasts  of  Moses  Linfield,  who 
was  credited  in  the  first  three  months  of  1854  with  53  lasts  of 
various  sizes.^  Thus  there  was  an  increasing  amount  of  specializ- 
ing among  manufacturers  concerned  in  boot  making  and  allied 
trades  in  Randolph  as  in  the  Lynn  region. 

By  the  close  of  this  period,  North  Bridgewater  (Brockton)  had, 
like  Lynn,  developed  industries  allied  to  the  boot  and  shoe  manu- 
facture on  a  larger  scale  than  any  other  shoe  centre.  There  are 
figures  from  a  local  census  in  1855  to  show  this: 


Occupation  No.  employed 

Shoemakers 420 

Bootmakers 134 

Shoe  cutters 37 

Shoe  manufacturers 

Boot  manufacturers 

Last  makers ' 

Awl  makers 

Boot  formers  (crimpers) .  .  . 

Boot  tree  makers 

Shoe  tool  makers 


21 
10 
7 
13 
6 
2 
9 


Occupation  No.  employed 

Shoe  tool  manufacturers 2 

Box  manufacturers i 

Awl  manufacturers 3 

Patent  leather  makers 3 

Boot  treers  6 

Currier i 

Trimmers s 

Blacking  makers 4 


Total  685 


Apr. 
May 


Account  of  Howard  and  French  with  J.  Winsor  Pratt 
1854  J.  Winsor  Pratt 

i8s4 
Nov.  10 


IS 
31 


Jan.   22 


Mar. 
Apr. 

May 

2 


Amt.  forward   $26.37 

136  Pes.  calf  pieces   6.83 

125     "     grained  pieces   4.05 

67     "  "  "        2.01 

S4     "     calf  "         2.70 

I  boot  box .37 

42  lbs.  ground  peas   1.26 

39    "    calf  pieces 1.95 

96    "       "         "       4.80 

i8ss 

Amt.  Brought  up 14990 

160  lbs.  Calf  Pes 8.00  (sc.) 

no    '    grd. 
77    "    calf 
SO    "    grd. 
1854     Jan.    17 
Feb.   n 


I8SS 
Jan.     8 

Apr.  18 


by  100  bunch  strings $29.00 


By  cash 5°  00 

"      «      20.00 

Use  of  horse  and  wagon   2.7S 


Dec.     I     200  bunch  strings 58.00 


"      3-30  (3c.) 

"      3.8s  (SC.) 

" ISO  (3C.) 

5  P  &  L  Lasts  3/9    $313 


1 1  "  "  «       "       "     6.88 

Mar.    7       6°""        "        "     3.75 

Mar.  14     11"""        "        " 6.88 

19       6"  "   «        -        -     3-7S 

24       s  "  "  J   H.  70    3  50 

a4       I  "  "  3/4 64 

as       8'«     soo 

53 
These  seven  men  made  4o,cxx)  lasts  valued  at  $10,000  that  year. 


92        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

These  men  with  the  help  of  domestic  workers  from  within  or 
outside  of  the  town,  made  66,056  pairs  of  boots  and  694,760 
pairs  of  shoes,  valued  at  $724,847,  in  1855. 

Relation  of  Machines  to  Economizing  of  Time  and  Labor 

The  development  of  technical  processes,  with  the  necessary- 
tools,  devices  and  machinery  for  boot  and  shoemaking  through 
all  its  stages  of  industrial  organization,  has  been  touched  only 
incidentally  in  these  chapters  so  far,  even  in  this  one  when  so 
many  new  devices  and  a  few  important  machines  were  being 
added  not  only  to  the  list  of  inventions,  but  also  to  the  average 
manufacturer's  stock  in  trade.  Just  enough  mention  has  been 
made  in  this  particular  chapter,  describing,  as  it  does,  the  organi- 
zation of  the  shoe  industry  in  the  third  phase  of  the  Domestic 
Stage,  to  explain  the  rapid  drift  of  shoe  manufacturers  to  stand- 
ardization of  product  and  to  economy  of  time  and  labor.  Yet 
the  development  of  even  such  machines  as  the  wax  thread  or  the 
dry  thread  for  stitching  uppers  rapidly  and  regularly  to  economize 
labor,  or  the  strippers  and  block  lasts  for  getting  uniformity  of 
product,  though  much  more  obvious,  was  not  nearly  so  vital  and 
effective  as  the  almost  unnoticed  drift  towards  factory-like  super- 
vision of  labor  on  boots  and  shoes  in  securing  both  standardiza- 
tion ^  and  economies  of  labor  and  of  stock. 

^  Old  workmen  did  not  see  this  point  then  or  in  later  life.  To  them  it  was  a 
trick  of  a  particular  manufacturer  to  make  more  money  somehow  out  of  his  workers, 
or  a  tempting  chance  of  making  better  money  for  themselves.  The  reason  for  the 
transition  from  a  laissez-faire  policy  to  central  shop  inspection  of  work  was  not  very 
apparent  to  them. 

Henry  P.  Crocker,  of  Raynham,  85  years  old  in  191 2,  described  one  case  of  thb 
transition.  The  finishing  of  soles  had  been  done  outside  with  little  uniformity  by  the 
individual  "makers"  who  put  on  the  soles.  When  the  Gilmore  Factory  took  the 
process  into  the  Central  Shop,  they  gave  a  man  only  one  cent  a  pair  for  finishing. 
Several  men  had  failed  to  make  a  living  at  it  and  Crocker  hesitated  at  the  offer,  in 
1847,  for  he  was  getting  $9.00  a  month  "making"  at  home  for  some  one  else.  Soon 
however,  he  was  earning  $1.00  a  day,  then  $2.00  and  sometimes  $3.00.  His  "part- 
ner" working  beside  him,  did  the  sand-papering,  Crocker  put  on  the  o.xalic  acid 
to  whiten  the  leather,  polished  it  with  a  sheep's  leg  bone,  stamped  it  with  the  firm 
name  and  gave  it  to  another  man  to  "dress." 


DOMESTIC  ST  AGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  93 

Review  of  Use  of  Tools  in  Earlier  Shoe  Manufacture  and 
the  Use  of  Machines  Before  18 jj 

Up  to  about  1840,  the  shoemaker  had  used  mainly  just  such 
tools  as  had  been  used  for  centuries.  His  kit,  already  described, 
included  a  lapstone  and  hammer  for  pounding  leather,  awls  for 
pegging  holes,  a  stirrup  for  holding  the  shoe  in  place  on  the  knee, 
pincers  to  pull  the  leather  over  the  last,  nippers  to  pull  out  tacks, 
bristles  for  needles,  and  hemp  thread  for  sewing,  a  bufhng  knife 
or  scraper  for  the  sole  leather,  and  a  shoulder-stick  for  polishing 
soles.  Then  there  came  a  little  skiving  machine,  run  by  hand, 
and  not  very  satisfactory  to  the  older  men,  accustomed  to  skiving 
with  a  regular  knife.  The  next  machines  to  be  invented  for  boot 
and  shoe  work  were  the  stripper,  for  cutting  up  sides  of  sole 
leather,  and  a  leather-rolling  machine,  which  came  in  1845  to 
save  both  time  and  strength  formerly  used  in  hammering  the 
sole  leather  on  a  lapstone. 

Because  the  market  was  already  making  hints  if  not  demands 
as  to  styles  instead  of  accepting  quietly  anything  the  shoemaker 
provided,  the  use  of  different  shapes  and  widths  of  block  lasts 
came  in  the  early  40's.  Shoemakers  no  longer  depended  upon 
"instep  leathers"  for  making  "fulls"  and  "slims."  Substantial 
patterns  came  into  use.  Sole  patterns  which  gave  uniformity  of 
shape  and  width  at  ball  and  shank,  and  patterns  for  rounding  the 
soles  after  they  were  stitched,  were  invented.  Irons  for  poHshing 
the  edges  came  into  use.  Heels  were  put  on  women's  shoes  again, ^ 
and  men  began  to  specialize  in  heeling.  Several  styles  of  pegging 
machines,^  and  a  machine  for  cutting  up  pegs  had  been  patented 
and  put  in  general  use  by  the  time  '  the  sewing  machine,  invented 
by  Howe  in  1846,  had  been  adapted  to  upper  leather  work  on 

'  Spring  heels,  which  took  the  place  of  high  ones  in  1830,  had  given  place  to  no 
heels  at  all.  Brogans  were  almost  heelless,  having  but  one  lift.  Cf.  Johnson,  L>'nn 
Sketches,  p.  340. 

*  Cf.  Rehe,  pp.  180,  189,  for  the  story  of  Krantz  and  the  introduction  of  the 
pegging  machine  into  Germany. 

'  Proofs  of  dates  of  invention  are  in  an  unsatisfactory  state  at  present.  Not  only 
local  historians  and  biographers,  but  the  United  States  Census  Reports  of  i860  and 
1900,  give  merely  approximate  or  relative  dates  for  many  inventions  and  for  their 
introduction  to  practical  use. 


94        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

shoes  by  John  Brooks  Nichols  in  1852.^  There  was  the  "dry 
thread"  machine  with  a  shuttle  and  two  threads  for  the  lighter 
upper  work,  and  the  ''wax  thread"  to  do  chain  stitching  for  the 
heavy  work  of  "siding  up"  bootlegs.  These  sewing  machines 
even  then  impressed  people  with  their  significance.  Instead  of 
merely  making  things  easier  or  a  "bit  more  speedy,"  they  pro- 
duced work  which  could  not  be  matched  by  hand  in  either  speed 
or  appearance. 

Summary  of  Third  Phase  of  Domestic  Stage 

To  give  a  brief  summary  of  the  development,  characteristics 
and  attendant  results  and  policies  of  the  third  phase  of  the 
Domestic  Stage  seems  worth  while,  even  if  it  involves  repetition. 

In  1840,  a  new  trade  with  new  markets  was  gradually  emerg- 
ing from  the  old  boot  and  shoe  trade,  but  it  had  to  be  coaxed. 
New  styles,  niceties  and  novelties  in  processes  required  greater 
specialization.  No  manufacturer  could  afford  to  lose  a  single 
customer  by  slipshod  work  or  poor  stock.  The  competition  for 
employment  gave  the  employers  a  chance  to  choose  only  the  best 
workmen.  Only  those  shoemakers  were  in  demand  who  had  de- 
veloped a  reputation  for  a  specialty,-  like  pegging,  crimping, 
treeing  or  finishing. 

More  workers  were  taken  into  the  central  shops  ^  and  expected 
to  do  one  thing  "up  to  the  standard,"  e.  g.,  they  were  hired  to  tree 
boots,  or  to  finish  bottoms.  Not  only  every  sole  in  a  case  must  be 
uniformly  finished,  but  the  appearance  of  the  shoes  in  all  the 
cases  sent  to  one  customer  must  be  the  same.   Competition  led  to 

*  For  details  concerning  Nichols  and  his  adaptation  of  the  Howe  Machine,  see  the 
Sewing  Machine  Journal  of  April  25,  May  25,  1904,  July  10,  July  25  and  February 
10,  191 1.  These  are  the  first-hand  reports  and  illustrated.  They  give  valuable  facts 
on  the  Howe-Singer-Leavitt  machine  controversy. 

^  Samuel  White,  of  Randolph  (b.  1831),  was  known  as  a  champion  rapid  pegger. 
Spectators  came  from  neighboring  towns  in  the  late  40's  to  watch  him  work  in  his 
little  ten-footer  on  Union  Street.  He  has  told  me  that  his  speed  was  gained  by  using 
both  hands  at  once  running  the  dink,  using  the  awl,  and  hammering  in  pegs  in  quick 
succession,  while  he  held  his  supply  of  pegs  in  his  mouth.  Cf.  Case  of  Henry 
Crocker  as  finisher,  footnote,  p.  92  and  Luther  Rowe  as  treer,  p.  88. 

3  Central  shops  were  frequently  spoken  of  as  manufactories  during  the  40's  and 
early  so's. 


DOMESTIC  ST  AGE  —  PUTTING-OUT  SYSTEM  95 

new  styles  of  long  legged  boots  to  fit  conditions  of  Western  life, 
first  of  Australia  and  then  of  California  in  turn.  Wholesale  manu- 
facturers attempted  to  capture  the  liking  of  men  of  Southern  and 
Western  frontiers,  who  had  been  used  to  custom-made  shoes  all 
their  lives.  It  goes  without  saying  that  there  were  no  custom  boot- 
makers in  Western  frontier  settlements  to  take  individual  orders. 
Riding  horseback  and  walking  over  prairies  needed  peculiar  styles 
adapted  to  their  peculiar  demands.  So  did  digging  in  gold  mines 
and  climbing  mountain  trails.  Old  traditions  were  unsettled. 
The  well-to-do  man  in  Boston  and  Baltimore  did  not  dream  of 
wearing  any  but  custom-made  boots  or  shoes.  The  well-to-do 
man  on  the  frontier  in  San  Francisco  or  Melbourne,  Australia,  * 
had  come,  however,  by  1855,  to  supplying  his  needs  at  a  retail 
shoe  store  with  no  qualm  or  scorn.  The  organization  that  had 
been  built  up  for  supplying  the  Southern  trade  with  brogans  was 
capable  of  enlargement;  the  whetted  appetites  of  entrepreneurs 
were  ready  for  more  profits  even  with  new  risks.  To  get  the 
shoes  to  distant  points  on  time,  to  make  them  appear  attractive 
enough  to  hold  customers,  and  to  keep  all  the  work  in  a  hundred  \ 
cases  of  boots  up  to  the  standard  of  the  sample,  needed  a  new 
organization  of  manufacturing  methods  and  processes.  Specializ- 
ing and  labor-saving  went  hand  in  hand  with  standardizing. 
This  increasing  specialization  led  to  the  entrance  into  the  shoe 
trade  of  young  men  and  women  who  learned  and  knew  just  one 
process,  and  to  the  cessation  of  regular  apprenticeship  ^  for  shoe- 
makers. 

Not  only  did  labor  have  to  become  more  specialized  and  effi- 
cient in  this  recuperating  period  of  the  40's,  the  third  and  final  ^ 
phase  of  the  Domestic  Stage,  but  it  had  to  be  economized  to  meet 
closer  competition.  That  fact,  added  to  the  demand  for  stand- 
ardization of  product,  led  to  the  introduction  of  more  machinery 
into  the  boot  and  shoe  industry.  By  1855  so  general  had  become 
the  use  of  sewing  machines  that  shoemakers,  who  could  afford  it, 
had  them  in  their  homes  to  use  on  both  cloth  and  leather.   But  it 

'  There  seems  to  be  no  definite,  or  even  indefinite,  case  in  Massachusetts  of  a    ^ 
shoemaker's  becoming  a  regular  apprentice  to  learn  to  make  a  whole  boot  after 
1840.    This  has  been  a  point  m  my  investigation  for  several  years. 


g6        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

was  left  generally  for  the  manufacturer  to  put  the  machines  into 
his  central  shop,  or  for  the  man  with  some  capital  and  genius 
for  machinery,  who  bought  or  leased  the  "wax  thread"  and  "dry 
thread"  machines,  to  set  them  up  either  in  a  stitching  shop  or  in 
a  central  shop  where  space  was  hired.  The  more  adaptable  men 
and  young  women  followed  the  machines  into  the  shops,  leaving 
the  older  people  to  "side  up"  and  bind  shoes  by  hand  at  home. 
Thus  a  new  stage  of  organization  came  in  the  boot  and  shoe  in- 
dustry, bringing  to  an  end  not  only  the  third  phase  but  the  main 
life  of  the  Domestic  Stage,  where  the  "putting  out"  system  had 
prevailed  and  the  entrepreneur  had  worked  in  his  central  shop 
while  the  domestic  workers  labored  in  their  "ten-footers."  Only 
the  "making,"  i.  e.,  lasting  and  bottoming,  of  sewed  shoes  con- 
tinued to  be  done  by  domestic  workers  far  into  the  next  period, 
imtil  the  McKay  machine  for  sewing  soles  and  finally  the  Good- 
year welting  machine  put  an  end  to  this  last  survival  of  the 
Domestic  System. 


CHAPTER  V 

FACTORY  STAGE,  1855-1920 

Phase  i,  1855-1875 

More  direct  control  and  supervision,  with  all  workers  in  the  factory,  which  is  the 
old  Central  Shop  enlarged  or  replaced  by  a  larger  building. 
Chief  Characteristic  —  Direct  Supervision. 
(i)  Origin  of  Factory  Stage. 

Local  explanations  of  the  rise  of  the  Factory  Stage  in  boot  and  shoe  manu- 
facture. 
External  signs  of  the  new  Factor>'  System. 
.Effect  of  Califomian  and  Australian  trade. 

(2)  Development  of  Factories  up  to  i860. 
Transportation  in  the  50's  and  6o's. 

Financial  crisis  of  1857,  and  its  effects  on  the  boot  and  shoe  trade;  crisis 
feared  but  not  experienced  in  Randolph.  Lynn  suffered  some.  Conditions 
in  the  Boston  shoe  trade.   Boston  shipping  lists  as  indicators. 

Development  of  factory  buildings  for  the  boot  and  shoe  industry.  The  Gil- 
more  factor>'  in  Raynham.   Lynn  factories. 

New  England  boot  and  shoe  manufacture  in  i860. 

Massachusetts  boot  and  shoe  manufacture  in  i860. 

Brookfield  boot  and  shoe  manufacture  in  i860. 

Accounts  of  Kimball  and  Robinson,  showing  sur\'ival  of  Domestic  System: 
probable  reasons:  later  rapid  development  of  factor>'  organization:  work 
book  and  order  book  under  new  firm  name  of  H.  E.  Twitchell. 

(3)  Development  from  Civil  War  to  1875. 

Effect  of  Civil  War  on  boot  and  shoe  manufacture.  North  Bridgewater's 

(Brockton)  slow  development  into  the  McKay  shoe  specialty  under  factory 

conditions. 

Lynn's  factory  conditions  at  the  close  of  1865,  and  of  1875. 
E.  and  A.  H.  Batcheller's  factory  at  North  Brookfield  as  the  largest  in  1865 

and  1875;    accounts  to  show  volume  and  details  of  their  business;    the 

contract  system. 

(4)  Summary  of  the  rise  of  the  Factory  System  and  progress  in  boot  and  shoe 

industrial  organization  to  1875. 

Phase  i,  1855-1875 

Rise  of  the  Factory 

Supervision  at  the  central  shop  of  work  done  on  boots  and  shoes, 
whether  at  home  or  in  the  shop,  was  the  less  obvious  but  the 
vitally  important  characteristic  of  the  Factory  Stage.    Its  need 

07 


98        ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

had  been  felt  aijd  met  to  a  rapidly  increasing  degree  in  the  close 
of  the  Domestic  Stage.  The  Factory  Stage  did  not  come  into 
existence  in  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  because,  as  it  is  commonly 
supposed,  the  central  shop  was  replaced  by  a  larger  building 
called  a  manufactory  or  factory,  nor  because  of  the  installation 
in  it  of  heavy  expensive  machinery,  nor  the  use  of  power  to  run 
it,  but  because  industrial  organization,  in  order  to  secure  uni- 
formity of  output,  economy  of  time,  labor,  and  stock,  demanded 
foremen  to  superintend,  and  regular  hours  of  steady  work  on  the 
part  of  men  and  women  employed  in  all  of  the  processes  of  shoe- 
making. 

Local  Explanation  of  Rise  of  Factory  Stage 

While  central  supervision  had  been  gradually  discovered  to  be 
effective  by  individual  entrepreneurs  here  and  there,  its  presence 
as  a  recognized  factor  in  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  was  not  ap- 
parent to  the  shoemakers  themselves  until  about  1855.  Just 
which  of  the  shoe  centres  had  the  greatest  amount  of  factory-like 
organization  first,  it  is  hard  to  determine,  though  probability 
points  to  Lynn,  where  the  industrial  organization  for  the  shoe 
industry  had  always  matured  both  early  and  rapidly.  The  answer 
to  the  question  depends  upon  the  local  experience  of  shoemakers, 
e.  g.,  in  Randolph  old  shoemakers  say  that  the  Calif ornian  and 
Australian  demand  for  boots,  and  Jonathan  Wales's  insistence  on 
prompt  delivery  of  ordered  goods,  necessitated  changes  in  the 
system  of  production.  Yet  Brookfield,  with  its  output  of  brogans 
for  the  South  and  Middle  West,  like  Lynn,  with  orders  for 
women's  shoes,  had  in  turn  entered  upon  this  Factory  System 
gradually  though  definitely,  without  sharing  in  the  impetus  of 
Californian  markets.  It  was  well  established  throughout  Massa- 
chusetts before  the  McKay  machines,  run  by  power,  "  took  work 
away  from  men  who  had  been  domestic  workers  "  ;  and  before  the  ^ 
Civil  War, by  "using  men  for  the  army,  required  their  replacement 
by  women  who  ceased  to  be  domestic  workers."  Neither  of  these 
so-called  explanations  of  the  coming  of  the  Factory  System 
offered  by  several  men  when  questioned  are  logical  or  true  to 
facts.    Though  the  causes  of  the  introduction  of  the  Factory 


FACTORY  STAGE  99 

System  in  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  were  the  same  from  one  end 
of  Massachusetts  to  the  other,  the  occasion  and  progress  took  on 
local  expression  to  meet  local  conditions. 

Special  Impetus  and  Response  to  Factory  Organization 

in  Randolph 

In  Randolph  and  other  Norfolk  County  and  Plymouth  County 
boot  and  shoe  towns,  immense  orders  with  big  profits  stirred  and 
pushed  the  boot  and  shoe  industrial  organization  to  its  very  limit 
of  production.  Forty-niners  who  had  left  shoemaking  interests  at 
home  naturally  saw  the  chances  for  marketing  Massachusetts 
boots  in  Cahfornia.  The  same  held  true  in  Australia.-  Randolph 
boot  manufacturers  '  were  among  the  firms  to  profit  earliest  by 
this  trade.  Mr.  Jonathan  Wales  left  his  home  town  in  time  to 
have  a  shoe  store  established  in  San  Francisco  in  185 1.  At  first 
he  bought  his  goods  of  the  Wentworth,  the  Whitcomb.  and  the 
Howard  and  French  factories  of  Randolph.  His  business  in- 
creased until  he  was  handling  boots  and  shoes  from  over  twenty 
firms  in  Randolph,  Stoughton,  and  North  Bridgewater.  Mean- 
while he  had  entered  the  firm  of  Newhall  and  Gregory,  of  San 
Francisco,  who  sold  at  auction  all  the  boots  and  shoes  consigned 
to  Jonathan  Wales.  Mr.  Frank  Magm're  estabhshed  himself  as 
agent  in  Melbourne,  Australia,  and  marketed  almost  the  entire 
output  of  the  Burrell  and  Maguire  factory  in  Randolph.  Both 
Mr.  Wales  and  Mr.  Maguire,  as  distributing  agents,  sent  home 
to  their  employing  manufacturers  new  orders  that  then  seemed 
incredibly  large,  and  either  drafts  on  Boston  banks  or  bags  of 
gold  in  payment.- 

'  The  largest  boot  and  shoe  firms  in  Randolph  during  the  50's  were  Whitcomb's . 
Wentworth's,  Howard  and  French's,  Strong's,  H.  Bingley  Alden's,  BurrcU  and 
Maguire's,  Clarke's,  and  Howard's.  Of  these,  Alden's  firm  had  a  store  in  Baltimore 
and  was  working  mainly  on  high  class  boots  for  the  Southern  trade. 

^  I  have  seen  at  the  home  of  Mr.  Wales's  son  and  daughter,  some  of  these  bags, 
made  of  white  drilling  and  stencilled  with  large  figures  giving  the  amounts,  some- 
times as  high  as  $20  000.  A  large  silver  salver,  presented  to  Mr.  Jonathan  Wales  in 
1856,  gives  the  names  as  donors  of  twenty  men  who  were  connected  with  the  firms 
which  had  profited  by  his  skill  and  efforts. 


lOO     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Adaptation  to  Needs  of  Speed  and  Large  Scale  Production 

Such  orders  could  not  be  satisfactorily  filled  with  the  old  rate  of 
speed  and  equipment.  When  a  hundred  or  more  case^  were  en- 
gaged to  go  on  a  certain  steamer,  due  to  leave  Boston  for  its  route 
round  ''the  Horn"  on  a  certain  day,  duly  advertised,  the  boots 
must  be  done  on  time  or  risk  being  rejected  at  their  tardy  arrival 
in  California  or  Australia.  Formerly  the  domestic  worker  had 
enjoyed  aU  the  latitude  he  needed  or  wished.  He  sowed  his  fields 
(^  and  cut  his  hay  when  he  was  ready;  he  locked  up  his  "  ten-footer  " 
and  went  fishing  when  he  pleased,  or  sat  in  his  kitchen  reading 
when  it  was  too  cold  to  work  in  his  little  shop. 

Manufacturers  could  never  be  sure  when  washouts  or  snow 
storms  might  make  the  return  of  stock,  sent  out  to  a  radius  of 
over  twenty  miles,^  well-nigh  impossible  for  days,  if  not  weeks. 
Account  books  show  that  the  women  who  "fitted"  and  the  men 
who  "made"  boots  and  shoes  were  iKregularly  employed  before 
the  late  50's,  and  obviously  at  their  own  request.  They  knew 
that  the  work  must  be  inspected  at  the  central  shop  before  they 
were  paid,  but  the  pay  "would  keep." 

The  rush,  then,  of  the  CaUfornian  and  Australian  trade  put  a 
stop  to  this  condition  in  every  shop  when  it  brought  orders  from 
new  trade  or  increased  those  from  the  old.  More  crimping 
and  treeing,  as  well  as  cutting,  pasting,  and  finishing  was  done 
"under  the  roof."  ^  There  was  now  a  greater  inducement  to 
manufacturers  to  invest  in  sewing  machines  for  the  uppers,  and 
to  have  the  siding  up  and  binding  done  in  the  shop  by  men '  on 

^  Occasionally  goods  were  sent  much  farther.  Nantucket  shoe  manufacturers 
ro~wed  over  to  the  mainland  at  Hyannis  and  took  cases  of  shoes  or  boots  to  bottom 
that  had  been  sent  down  from  Weymouth  or  Abington  factories.  Until  the  ice  on 
Vineyard  Sound  broke  up  towards  spring,  the  finished  goods  could  not  be  returned 
by  these  domestic  workers.  Cf.  story  of  Asa  Jones,  p.  137,  in  Chap.  VI. 

2  Girls  went  into  shops  to  paste,  in  the  50's.  At  Burrell  and  Maguire's,  there 
were  twenty-five  or  thirty  girls  who  pasted  in  straps  and  put  p'eces  of  bright  colored 
morocco  across  the  upper  parts  of  the  vamps.  At  Whitcomb's  and  at  Strong's  girls 
went  into  the  factory  long  before  power  machines,  but  it  was  not  until  after  1 865 
that  they  were  employed  instead  of  men  to  run  sewing  machines  in  factories  in 
Randolph  and  neighboring  towns. 

'  Cf.  pp.  93,  94  for  details  of  machines. 


FACTORY  STAGE  lOI 

dry  thread  and  wax  thread  machines,  instead  of  by  the  women  at 
home.  In  the  previous  chapter,  figures  have  been  given  for  the 
work  and  wages  of  men  working  for  Howard  and  French  in  their 
factory  in  the  late  50's  on  the  "Cahfomians."  At  Whitcomb's 
Factory,  still  called  a  shop  ^  in  those  days,  there  were  eight  or  nine 
cutters  at  work  on  stock.  The  whole  output  of  this  firm  was  sold 
to  Jonathan  Wales  for  several  years  and  so  was  most  of  the  out- 
put from  Wentworth's.  Strong's  factory  either  failed  to  get  a 
share  in  this  CaHfomia  trade,  or  did  not  want  it.  Mr.  Strong 
sold  his  product  from  his  Boston  office  and  let  Mr.  Sidney  French 
manage  the  factory.  His  interest  was  for  some  time  in  developing 
the  Congress  shoe,  already  tried  out  in  Weymouth  and  in  Lynn. 
His  was  the  first  Randolph  factory  to  put  in  the  McKay  machine, 
and  Mr.  French  as  manager  seems  to  have  been  progressive 
enough  to  have  produced  up  to  the  standard  -demanded  by  Jona- 
than Wales,  and  by  Frank  Maguire.  The  Burrell  and  Maguire 
factory  ran  to  its  limit  of  space  and  speed,  and  seems  to  have  made 
a  monopoly  of  the  Austrahan  trade  —  helped  thereto  by  the  fact 
that  Mr.  George  Maguire,  the  son,  was  their  sole  representative 
in  Australia  and  had  been  appointed  American  Consul  at  Mel- 
bourne.^ 

Transportation  in  the  ^o's 

The  "far  away  feeling"  for  not  only  California,  but  Australia, 
had  been  done  away  with  in  many  minds  in  the  shoe  towns  of 
Massachusetts  by  the  story  of  "Two  Years  Before  the  Mast"^ 
which  was  passed  from  hand  to  hand  in  the  40's  and  50's.  The 
shoemakers  not  only  enjoyed  the  adventure,  but  had  a  near 
interest  born  of  a  feeling  they  were  working  perhaps  on  some  of 
the  very  hides  that  had  come  back  around  "  the  Horn"  as  return 
cargo  in  just  such  ships  as  the  Pilgrim.   The  sight  of  posters  and 

*  Even  now  shoeworkers  who  are  over  40  years  of  age  commonly  speak  of  their 
respective  factories  as  shops. 

*  In  1857,  there  was  a  Boston  office,  as  this  advertisement  shows: 

James  Maguire  and  Co., 

Manufacturers  of  Boots.     Factory  Main  St.,  Randolph 

Store  105  Pearl  Street,  Boston. 

'  Two  Years  before  the  Mast,  by  Richard  Henry  Dana,  Jr.   Published  1840. 


102     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

the  distribution  of  small  colored  cards,i  advertising  the  sailing 
and  services  of  ships,  added  zest  to  their  interest.  Just  as  men  and 
boys  know  the  record  and  makes  of  automobiles  today,  men  and 
boys  knew  then  about  various  cUppers. 

The  expansion  and  adaptation  of  transportation  on  land  was 
just  as  rapid  and  marvellous  as  that  at  sea.  Railroads  were  link- 
ing up  New  England  and  the  Atlantic  Seaboard  States,  and 
running  out  through  the  AUeghenies  towards  the  Middle  West. 
Then  dispatch  companies  took  up  the  task  of  conveyance  for  the 
rest  of  the  way  across  the  plains,  linking  up  regions  not  yet  pene- 
trated by  the  railroads. 

Banking  Facilities  in  the  jo^s 

If  the  tens  of  thousands  of  gold  could  be  transmitted  safely  and 
promptly  from  one  end  of  the  continent  to  the  other,  drafts  and 
checks  in  mails  could  be.  A  larger  use  of  banking  facilities  and 
of  credit  was  becoming  general.  This  is  illustrated  by  two  pages  ^ 
taken  at  random  from  the  account  books  of  the  firm  of  C.  and 
A.  H.  Gilmore,  of  Raynham,  Massachusetts. 

1  "A  small  Celebrated  A  i  Extreme  Clipper  Ship  for  San  Francisco.  Merchants' 
Express  Line  of  Clipper  Ships"  was  the  headline  of  one  card.  Under  this  was  a 
colored  picture  of  the  ocean,  a  full-rigged  clipper,  with  sails  set,  a  lighthouse  in  mid- 
ocean;  "Grace  Darling"  in  large  letters,  and  the  picture  of  this  heroine  in  a  red 
robe  against  a  green  background,  bound  with  heavy  rope  and  crossed  oars  were 
placed  beneath.  Then  returning  to  appeal  in  printed  words,  there  appeared: 

Shippers  are  invited  to  examine  this  widely  celebrated  line. 
Randolph  M.  Cooley,  Manager. 
Agents  in  San  Francisco  88  Wall  Street 

Messrs.  DeWitt,  Kittle  &  Co.  N.  Y. 

The  Winsor  Line  advertised  in  cards  so  attractive  then  that  they  have  been  pre- 
served among  family  treasures  until  today.   Here  are  the  contents  of  one  of  them : 

WLnsor's  Regular  Line,  For  San  Francisco.    From  India  Wharf. 

To  sail  June  25th.    The  Celebrated  Extreme  New  York  Clipper  Ship  Golden  City,  Capt.  Leary. 

This  Ship  has  been  put  in  the  most  perfect  order,  and  is  now  in  her  berth  with  a  part  of  her  cargo 

on  board.     She  is  the  great  favorite  with  New  York  shippers. 
Her  passages  have  been  made  in  102  and  106  days,  while  other  clipper  ships,  sailing  at  the  same 

time,  were  120  days. 
Her  ventilation  is  perfect,  and  her  cargoes  have  been  delivered  in  the  most  perfect  order.    Shippers 

who  wish  to  be  sure  of  their  goods  reaching  California  in  October,  will  appreciate  her. 
The  well  known  favorite  medium  ship  Cromwell,  Capt.  Adams,  now  in  her  berth,  and  loading, 

will  sail  about  the  1st  of  July. 
For  Freight  or  Passage,  apply  to 
Nath'l  Winslow,  Jr.  &  Co. 

comer  of  State  and  Broad  Sts. 
June  7,  1858.  Watson's  Press,  25  Doane  St. 

2  See  Appendix  XXIIL 


FACTORY  STAGE  IO3 

Financial  Crisis  of  i8jy  Afeded  the  Boot  and  Shoe  Trade 

Bills  were  not  only  more  promptly  paid  by  wholesale  cus- 
tomers on  the  one  hand,  but  by  manufacturers  for  stock  and  for 
labor  on  the  other.  Good  times  led  manufacturers  to  put  up 
larger  shops;  to  install  expensive  machinery;  to  put  in  and  cut 
up  more  stock  in  hopes  of  even  better  times  ahead,  just  as  it  led 
their  workmen  to  build  houses  on  mortgages  which  seemed  rea- 
sonable in  view  of  future  wages  as  good  and  steady  as  the  present. 
Meanwhile,  manufacturers  and  employees  alike  in  other  indus- 
tries were  "booming  and  spending."  As  in  1837,  so  in  1857,  over- 
production, too  great  speculation,  too  much  tying  up  of  capital  in 
fixed  improvements  or  investments  led  to  a  financial  crisis. 

Crisis  Feared^  though  not  Experienced,  in  the  Rayidolph 

Shoe  Trade 

The  general  features  of  this  crisis,  the  so-called  Panic  of  1857, 
are  familiar  to  all.  A  file  of  the  Randolph  Transcript  published 
that  year,  quoting  news  and  impressions  from  other  shoe  centres, 
gives  a  bit  of  local  light  and  color  on  the  question,  at  least  as  it 
was  viewed  in  1857,  which  is  valuable  for  this  study.  Randolph 
as  a  boot  centre,  closely  tied  to  San  Francisco  and  to  Melbourne, 
was,  after  all,  just  a  little  town  doing  a  relatively  large  business  in 
boot  manufacture.  It  dreaded  hard  times,  not  in  general,  but  in 
the  shoe  trade.  The  first  issue  of  this  paper,  on  March  14,  1857, 
was  congratulatory  and  optimistic  in  its  general  tenor.  No  hint  of 
depression  appears  at  first.  "  Randolph  has  a  population  of  five  or 
six  thousand;  enough  to  make  two  cities  out  West.  That  being 
the  case,  it  seems  as  though  there  might  be  business  enough  for 
one  printing  office." 

Boston  and  Randolph,  though  only  fourteen  miles  apart,  were 
not  then  linked  by  railroad.  Stage  coach  and  expresses  were 
transporting  passengers  and  freight.  The  various  boot  and  shoe 
firms  had  their  own  express  wagons  or  employed  private  expresses 
as  a  rule.   One,  Cole's,'  was  for  the  general  public  to  use. 

'  "Cole's  Randolph  and  Boston  Express  leaves  Randolph  daily  at  8  o'clock  a.m. 
OflBces  at  the  store  of  R.  W.  Turner  and  at  the  residence  of  the  proprietor.  Return- 
ing, leaves  ofEce  at  34  Dock  Square,  Boston,  at  3  o'clock  p.m."  Turner's  Store  was  on 


I04     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

This  same  issue  of  the  newspaper  gave  a  history  of  the  boot 

and  shoe  trade  of  the  town  to  date,  closing  with  the  figures  taken 

from  the  Massachusetts  Census  of  1855,  showing  that  Randolph 

had  made  in  that  year 

345,100  pairs  of  boots  1  To  the  value  of 

363,300  pairs  of  shoes  J  $1,269,400 

Males  employed  for  this mo 

Females  employed  for  this 422        1532^ 

"All  the  other  industrial  pursuits  of  the  town,"  it  continued,  "of 
such  character  as  to  find  their  way  into  statistical  documents,^ 
do  not  amount  to  a  sum  at  all  comparable  with  that  of  the  above 
manufacture,"  totalling  only  $129,483.  With  the  valuation  of  the 
town  amounting  to  $2,123,440,  the  Town  Meeting  of  March  30, 
1857  had  voted  $4200  for  the  schools,  $2000  for  the  highways,  and 
$8000  for  town  expenses.  To  keep  up  this  scale  of  expenditures, 
the  boot  and  shoe  business  as  the  main  industry  must  succeed. 
The  prices  of  leather  ^  and  the  reports  of  shoe  •*  trade  in  other 

"the  Hill,"  the  old  precinct  centre,  where  the  roads  from  Braintree  to  Bridgewater 
meet  the  roads  from  the  Weymouths  and  Abingtons,  and  was  therefore  central. 

1  This  total  was  practically  all  the  working  population  of  men  and  women  out- 
side the  farm  and  farmhouse. 

2  Randolph's  Financial  Statistics  for  1857: 

Hay  is  raised  to  the  amount  of    $23,928 

Wood  sold  or  prepared  for  market i7fOSo 

Boxes  made  13.000 

Lumber  for  market 7.7oo 

Potatoes 8,076 

Com   2.00s 

Rye  157 

Apples 2.162 

Pears 600 

Cranberries    2,650 

Live  stock    S2,iSS  $129,483 

Value  of  the  town $2,123,440 

'»  The  issue  of  March  28,  1857,  quotes  leather  prices: 

Sole,  light    32  @  34 

Sole,  middle    32  @  34 

Sole,  heavy  30  @  31 

Calf  skin  currie 70  @  80 

Calf  light 6s  @  75 

Sheep  skins  25  @  34 

"Stock  b  small  and  demand  active." 

*  On  April  II,  this  paper  announced  that  "the  shoe  trade  of  New  York  is  grow- 
ing better  —  trade  is  increasing  both  locally  and  from  the  South."  It  spoke  also  at 


FACTORY  STAGE  105 

states  were  of  great  importance.  While  some  days'  news  must 
have  sounded  hopeful  to  Randolph  readers,  a  quotation  from  the 
Newbury  port  Herald  ^  must  have  chilled  their  hopes : 

The  shoe  business  has  been  prostrated  by  adverse  circumstances  till  it  is  at 
the  lowest  point  that  has  been  reached  for  years  and  many  manufacturers 
especially  of  women's  shoes  are  reducing  the  rates  of  labor  and  discharging 
hands.  It  is  found  also  that  the  manufacture  has  exceeded  the  demand  not- 
withstanding the  short  work. 

Conditions  in  the  Lynn  Boot  and  Shoe  Centre 

About  the  middle  of  April,  the  Newburyport  Herald  reported 
the  failure  of  Baker  and  Brothers,  "extensive  shoe  manufacturers 
of  Lynn."  It  was  a  bad  failure  of  from  $100,000  to  $200,000,  and 
the  first  heavy  failure  among  Lynn  manufacturers  for  ten  years, 
"as  indeed  now  there  is  the  heaviest  pressure  upon  the  trade  for 
ten  years.  This  firm  employed  five  hundred  hands.  Their  debts 
were  in  Boston  and  other  cities,  the  heaviest  being  in  Baltimore." 
The  account  closed  with  the  announcement  that  "very  many  of 
the  manufacturers  of  shoes  are  curtailing  their  business."  This 
was,  of  course,  in  the  Lynn-Haverhill  region.  As  an  editorial, 
with  this  news  from  Newburyport  in  mind,  there  appeared  in  the 
Randolph  Transcript  an  article  on  the  shoe  business  which  gives 
the  best  key  to  one  specific  occasion  of  trouble  in  the  shoe  manu- 
facture of  Massachusetts  in  1857: 

It  is  probably  safe  to  say  that  not  more  than  half  of  the  towns  in  New 
England  know  about  this  interest  as  a  manufacture  within  their  borders. 
...  In  some  sections  it  is  the  ruling  business.  ...  In  many  a  town,  how- 
ever, a  case  of  shoes  looks  as  foreign  almost  as  a  box  of  oranges,  yet  the  trade 
is  an  important  one  for  Boston,  where  manufacturers  and  buyers  meet.  It  is 
claimed  that  bad  management  and  want  of  foresight  on  the  part  of  manu- 
facturers has  caused  leather  to  be  cut  up  beyond  the  demand  and  thus  so  great  a 
demand  for  stock  {i.  e.,  uncut  hides)  has  arisen  that  its  price  is  enhanced  out  of 
all  proportion  with  that  which  will  be  received  for  it  after  it  is  made  up  into 

length  of  direct  trade  to  begin  between  Chicago  and  Europe,  quoting  from  the 
Chicago  Press:  "We  hear  of  a  sale  which  transpired  on  Saturday  of  2,000  hides, 
heavy  and  kip,  for  Liverpool  by  a  vessel  to  arrive  here  early  in  May.  Also  samples 
of  hides  arc  being  put  up  for  Scotland  to  go  out  by  one  of  the  first  vessels  to  leave 
this  port." 

*  Newburyport  in  the  Essex  County  shoe  region  was  one  of  the  active  seaport 
shoe  manufacturing  towns. 


Io6     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

boots  and  shoes.  .  .  .  li  is  ssiid  that  a  grea.t  variety  of  styles  of  shoes  aire  inthe 
market,  many  of  which  are  very  slow  in  going  off.  .  .  .  It  is  not  unlikely 
that  during  this  dull  time,  many  workmen  will  change  their  occupation, 
fewer  will  learn  the  business  ^  and  manufacturers  will  themselves  feel  freer  to 
curtail  work  than  they  do  when  an  oversupply  of  workmen  are  dependent 
upon  their  business  for  support.  .  .  .  The  .  .  .  "good  time  coming"  we 
hope  will  be  speedy  in  its  approach.  .  .  .  The  Southern  Trade  which  it  is 
said  has  not  been  the  readiest  pay  is  now  the  best,  while  Western  traders  from 
overdealing  have  become  slow  and  unreliable.  Dealers^  who  were  to  get 
high  commissions  have  crowded  upon  the  West  a  larf^c  stock  on  long  credits, 
and  thus  induced  merchants  to  go  "beyond  their  depth."  As  we  said  before, 
these  are  only  temporary  ^  evils,  a  different  class  of  business  men  will  soon 
come  up  and  the  trade  will  assume  its  wonted  vigor. 

The  curtailing  in  shoe  shops  did  come  about,  and  a  week  later, 
April  25,  1857,  the  Lynn  Reporter  said  that  many  girls  who  had 
worked  on  machines  in  the  shoe  shops  of  that  city  were  now  out 
of  employment.  "Only  five  are  employed  in  one  establishment, 
which,  until  now  has  had  thirty.  The  manufacturers  are  cur- 
tailing their  business."  As  in  all  "hard  times"  a  suspicion  was 
cast  upon  the  medium  of  financial  operations.  An  article  which 
appeared  on  May  30th  on  the  "Banking  System  and  How  Banks 
do  the  Mischief,"  said  that  "the  promise  to  pay  on  demand  by 
specie  is  all  sham."  Two  weeks  later  there  came  the  "Answer  to 
Specie's  Arraignment"  in  May  —  which  was  highly  favorable  to 
paper  bills. 

Conditions  in  the  Boston  Shoe  Trade 

Before  June  was  over,  there  were  various  ideas  expressed  about 
the  future  price  of  leather.  It  was  quoted  at  thirty  cents  per 
pound.  Buyers  were  advised  by  some  to  wait  until  it  dropped  to 
twenty  cents  per  pound;  yet  others  thought  it  would  rise  after 
the  first  of  July.  "Others  in  Randolph  say  no."  Some  good  news 
came  in  July  4,  1857.^ 

*  This  is  just  what  happened  in  the  recuperating  years  of  the  shoe  business  after 
the  hard  times  of  1837,  though  probably  this  writer  did  not  know  it  and  thought  he 
was  merely  prophesying. 

2  This  is  an  interesting  concrete  statement  as  to  the  way  in  which  "over  produc- 
tion for  markets"  is  brought  about. 

2  Note  consistent  optimism  of  this  editor  in  a  matter  so  vitally  important  to  his 
shoe  town. 

^  In  the  same  issue  was  the  news  that  a  "factory  burned  on  June  17th  at  Canton 
on  the  Stoughton  turnpike  at  loss  of  $1600."  Note  use  of  word  "factory"  instead 
of  manufactory  or  shop. 


FACTORY  STAGE  I07 

Boot  and  shoe  trade  in  Boston  is  a  little  more  active.  Buyers  are  in  from 
the  South  and  West  for  small  purchases.  Old  goods  made  from  high  cost 
stock  sell  at  a  sacrifice,  while  some  made  from  stock  at  present  prices,  are 
slightly  remunerative.  .  .  .   The  trade  in  New  York  City  is  dull  and  declining. 

Boston  steadied  her  shoe  market  gradually.  On  July  nth,  it  was 
reported  as  better  still,  though  buyers  were  just  examining  stock, 
waiting  about  heavy  purchases. 

The  quantity  cleared  at  the  Boston  Custom  House  has  been  2596  cases  for 
the  week,  and  98,723  cases  since  January  i,  showing  a  falling  off  from  the 
Boston  shipping  list  of  14,504  cases  compared  with  last  year. 

Randolph,  however,  had  to  face  more  definite  news  of  the  shoe 
trade  which  would  affect  her  directly,  in  August,  when,  on  the 
twelfth,  the  Steamer  John  L.  Stephens,  from  San  Francisco,  re- 
ported that  those  markets  were  depressed  and  it  was  said  then 
that  it  would  need  a  suspension  of  shipments  for  two  or  three 
months  to  relieve  them.  This  struck  home  to  the  hearts  of  more 
boot  and  shoe  firms  in  Randolph  than  to  those  of  any  town  in 
Massachusetts,  and  affected  the  west  village  more  than  the  east. 
In  the  latter,  which  was  to  become  a  real  boot  town  in  the  seven- 
ties and  eighties,  the  firms  still  clung  to  manufacture  of  shoes,  and 
for  a  greater  variety  of  markets  than  was  the  poUcy  of  the  west 
village,  i.  e.,  Randolph  Centre,  which  had  gone  so  fully  into  the 
Californian  and  Australian  boot  trade. 

Even  with  the  glut  in  the  San  Francisco  market,  icx52  cases 
were  shipped  to  Cahfornia  in  the  week  ending  August  26,  as  re- 
ported in  the  New  York  Evening  Post,  which  said  that  southern 
buyers  were  purchasing  in  the  shoe  market  cautiously.  Hides  had 
declined  two  and  a  half  per  cent,  and  speculators  were  buying  up 
hemlock  soles  at  the  former  prices.  The  western  buyers  were  still 
waiting  to  see  how  crops  and  payments  might  be  in  the  West,  but 
the  Boston  Shipping  List  showed  a  continuous  active  demand. 
About  one-quarter  as  many  cases  were  shipped  from  New  York 
City  as  from  Boston  for  California  that  week.  The  market  was 
being  sparingly  supplied  by  the  manufacturers.  Evidently  the 
supply  and  demand  were  equalizing  themselves.  The  Randolph 
Transcript  for  September  12th  reported  that  local  factories  were 
still  running,  and  the  firms  were  hopeful.' 

'  In  an  article,  "Business  in  Other  Places." 


I08     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

As  for  Randolph,  it  is  much  as  it  has  been,  though  the  increasing  quantity 
of  leather  freighted  over  the  roads  shows  perhaps  that  there  is  going  to  be 
more  activity  in  boot  and  shoe  manufacturing.  We  hope  it  may  be  so.  Very 
few  if  any  shops  have  entirely  suspended  work.  There  have  been  no  failures 
with  a  single  exception,'  while  in  many  of  the  manufactories  the  hands  have 
had  no  more  leisure  time  than  they  needed  for  summer  recreation.^  This  is 
due  probably  to  the  choice  in  the  variety  of  markets  offered,  and  the  fact  that 
Randolph  firms  are  not  making  for  any  one  exclusively,  some  working  for 
foreign,  some  for  home  markets. 

Nearness  to  Boston  made  hope  contagious  evidently.  The 
same  paper  quoted  interesting  boot  and  shoe  figures. 

Boston  is  now  the  largest  shoe  market  in  the  world,  and  her  sales  exceed 
by  millions  of  dollars  those  of  any  other  city  on  the  globe.  There  are  218 
wholesale  and  jobbing  boot,  shoe  and  leather  dealers  in  Boston  ^  whose  gross 

sales  amounted  to $34,100,000 

106  hide  and  leather  dealers 26,650,000 

additional  sales  of  retailers 1,390,000 

Of  the  shoe  houses,    4  do  a  business  of  over $1,000,000  annually 

"«      «         "  2""        "         ""    800,000        " 

"     "      «         "         9   "   "        «         "     «    500,000 


u        u         u 


38  "  «      "       "    "   200,000 


The  whole  number  of  persons  employed  in  the  manufacture  of 
boots,  shoes,  and  leather  in  the  State  of  Massachusetts  was  given 
as  80,000  people.*  Those  employed  in  boot  and  shoemaking 
numbered  about  32,000.  Of  these  workers,  Randolph  was  supply- 
ing over  1000.^  The  hard  times  of  1857  left  this  town  of  five  and 

*  This  was  the  failure  of  H.  Bingley  Alden's  firm  and  did  not  affect  the  town  very 
materially.  It  was  due  to  slow  pay  in  the  Baltimore  markets  and  came  gradually. 

*  This  may  have  been  a  case  of  reassurance,  or  bravado,  intended  for  other 
towns'  ears,  or  else  it  may  have  been  the  real  truth.  Tradition  in  the  town  con- 
firms the  latter. 

*  The  United  States  Census  of  i860  gives  slightly  different  figures  for  Boston. 
"  Boston  in  1856  had  200  wholesale  and  jobbing  houses,  and  the  domestic  and  foreign 
shoe  trade  of  Massachusetts  amounted  to  $50,000,000."  These  figures  do  not  in- 
clude hides,  evidently:  "The  shipments  from  Boston  to  San  Francisco  alone  in  1856 
were  42,258  cases,  valued  at  $2,100,000."  We  have  figures  for  Ne./  York  City  two 
years  later  in  the  same  Census,  "New  York  in  1858  had  56  wholesale  and  600  to  800 
retail  boot  and  shoe  houses.  The  sales  of 

these  wholesale  houses  were $15,000,000 

these  retail  houses  were 5,000,000 

*  This  was  probably  from  the  Massachusetts  Census  of  1855.  I  doubt  if  any 
later  computation  had  been  made  and  published  before  September,  1857. 

*  See  figures  of  Census  of  i860. 


FACTORY  STAGE  I09 

one-half  thousand  inhabitants  ^  in  good  condition  financially,  and 
industrially.  On  October  10,  1857,  the  Randolph  Bank  paid  a 
dividend  of  five  per  cent,  and  the  statement  was  made  in  print 
that  the  bank  had  a  clear  surplus  of  $47,016.72.2 

The  general  business  depression  of  1857  seems  then  to  have 
done  little  damage  to  Randolph's  boot  and  shoe  trade,  and  not  to 
have  retarded  the  development  of  its  factory  organization  at  all. 
This  was  true  also  of  Lynn,  where,  in  spite  of  the  newspaper  re- 
ports of  some  curtailing  of  output  and  reduction  of  help,  with  an 
occasional  failure,  the  hard  times  made  the  manufacturers  more 
ready  to  adopt  the  Factory  System. 

Recuperation  of  tJie  Shoe  hidustry  and  Trade  from  Hard 
Times  and  Adaptation  to  War  Conditions,  185^-1865 

Recuperation  depended  mainly  upon  the  success  of  individual 
firms  in  securing  better  hold  in  old  markets  through  more  efficient 
organization  of  their  factories.  Competition  among  sellers  to  win 
the  orders  of  the  southern  and  western  buyers,  who  were  re- 
ported as  reluctant  and  slow  in  placing  orders,  naturally  led  to 
emphasis  on 'good  workmanship  and  speed  Stock  was  higher  in 
price,  and  waste  could  not  be  allowed.  Supervision  in  the  factory 
would  help  to  save  waste  and  to  secure  better  work  as  well  as 
speed.  Manufacturers  realized  that  the  shoe  machines,  which 
competitors  were  adopting  because  inventors  claimed  they  saved 
labor,  could  not  be  neglected  by  them.  Machines  for  the  uppers, 
both  the  skivers  and  the  dry  and  wax  thread  sewing  machines, 
were  already  in  very  general  use,  run  by  men  in  the  factories. 
Only  the  lasting  and  bottoming  were  done  by  hand  by  domestic 
workers,  and  even  they  often  worked  in  gangs  or  teams  in  a  hired 
room  in  the  factory,  instead  of  in  their  own  little  shops.    Times 

'  In  1850,  Randolph's  population  was  4638.  It  had  increased  19.40  per  cent  in 
five  years,  to  be  5538  in  1855. 

*  This,  of  course,  may  and  may  not  have  been  a  true  index  to  actual  financial 
conditions.  During  that  year,  however,  the  east  village  (which  later  became  the 
town  of  Holbrook)  had  built  a  church  costing  $20,000.  The  parish  was  aided  sub- 
stantially in  this  by  Everett  Holbrook,  one  of  its  wealthiest  shoe  manufacturers. 
In  May  4,  1857,  the  newspaper  had  said  that  Randolph  (including  both  villages) 
had  several  citizens  worth  over  $100,000,  and  one  worth  over  $300,000. 


no     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

were  good  for  these  lasters^and  bottomers  for  they  had  all  the 
work  they  could  do  to  equal  the  speed  of  the  output  aided  by  ma- 
chinery on  the  uppers.  The  same  condition  prevailed  in  all  the 
boot  and  shoe  centres,  which  awaited,  as  it  were,  unconsciously, 
the  coming  of  the  McKay  machine,  which  would  equalize  the 
speed  of  work  in  bottoming  and  in  upper  making. 

Development  of  Factory  Buildings  for  the  Boot  and  Shoe 

Industry 

Capital  enough  had  been  saved  during  the  good  times  of  the 
early  50's  to  build  good  substantial  buildings  for  the  larger  stock 
and  output  of  shoe  concerns,  and  to  provide  room  for  both  ma- 
chines and  the  workmen  to  run  them.  Of  all  the  factories  in 
Massachusetts,  the  so-called  **1inest"  was  built  by  the  firm  of  C. 
and  H.  T.  Gilmore,  in  Raynham,^  in  1857.-  It  was  very  different 
from  the  usual  grocery  store  or  private  house,  turned  into  a 
central  shop.  It  seemed  like  a  visible  proof  of  large  trade  and 
profits,^  for  it  had  a  wide  porch  with  Doric  columns,  an  ofi&ce 
fitted  with  Venetian  shades,  and  black  walnut  desks  and  railings. 
It  was  provided  with  an  elevator  and  dumb  waiters,  speaking 
tubes  for  every  room  to  the  office,  a  steam  whistle  to  summon 
employees,  and  a  driveway  through  the  lower  floor  for  ease 
and  expedition  in  receiving  and  shipping  freight.  There  was 
a  carpenter  shop  and  a  special  carpenter.    The  large  machine 

'  Up  to  the  6o's,  a  central  shop  that  turned  out  fifty  to  seventy-five  cases  a  week 
was  doing  a  "big  business."  The  AustraHan  trade  made  the  Randolph  shop  of 
Burrell  and  Maguire  enlarge  its  old  output  of  the  40's  and  early  50's.  An  offer  of 
$7.00  was  made  for  every  extra  case  over  100  that  could  be  gotten  out  in  a  week. 
One  week  112  cases  were  made  in  response. 

2  Twenty  miles  south  of  Randolph,  and  three  from  Taunton,  in  Bristol  County. 

'  The  capital  for  this  investment  was  the  result  of  savings  from  a  shoe  business 
dating  back  to  early  in  the  century,  when  Mr.  Cassander  Gilmore,  Sr.,  had  a  little 
shoe  shop  made  out  of  the  wash  house  by  the  brook,  for  his  Central  Shop.  He  was 
not  a  shoemaker  but  an  entrepreneur  who  saw  a  chance  of  profit  as  merchant 
capitalist.  A  few  years  later  he  had  built  a  new  central  shop,  some  50  X  100  feet. 
It  was  there  that  the  Gilmore  firm  worked  up  the  trade  in  children's  shoes  of  fancy 
colors  and  men's  and  boys'  brogans  and  plow  shoes  for  agents  to  dispose  of  in  Cuba 
and  New  Orleans.  Such  trade  in  turn,  from  product  made  in  the  old  shop,  made  it 
possible  for  the  Gilmores  to  lath  and  plaster  every  room  in  the  new  factory  and  have 
every  mop  board  and  door  painted  or  grained. 


FACTORY  STAGE  1 1 1 

shop,  with  a  forge  and  a  machinist  permanently  in  charge,  was 
probably  one  of  the  chief  reasons  why  Mr.  Blake  ^  and  Mr. 
McKay  came  to  this  factory,  five  years  later,  to  try  out  the  Mc- 
Kay machines,  while  Mr.  McKay  was  urging  the  Gilmore 
Brothers  to  help  finance  the  movement  of  putting  LheSpachine 
on  the  market.  Mr.  Cassander  Gilmore's  son,  Othniel,  was  in- 
venting machines  in  a  little  shop  in  the  yard  of  the  homestead 
across  the  street.  He  made  the  automatic  leveller,  a  press  for  the 
binding  after  it  was  stitched  on  the  upper,  a  punching  machine 
for  the  holes  in  the  quarters  of  the  Balmorals,  and  a  machine  to 
dink  the  holes  in  the  heel  before  it  was  nailed  by  hand.  Although 
neither  Mr.  Gilmore  of  the  firm,  nor  his  son,  believed  very  much 
in  Lyman  Blake,  they  entertained  both  Mr.  McKay  and  Mr. 
Blake  at  their  home  and  allowed  them  weeks  of  experimenting 
with  their  machines  in  this  factory,  without  installing  any 
permanently. 

Perhaps  the  Gilmores  had  already  put  too  much  fixed  capital 
into  the  factory  itself,  to  allow  them  to  invest  in  uncertain  stock 
or  rights  in  the  Blake-McKay  just  then;  perhaps  they  realized 
that  none  of  the  particular  kinds  of  shoes  they  were  making 
needed  McKay  stitched  soles.  Their  firm  was  making  for  Cuban 
Spaniards  two-holed  sailor-ties  which  had  white  soles  with  black 
and  yellow  stripes  on  them  "just  to  catch  the  Spaniard's  eye." 
The  uppers  were  of  black  split  leather.  The  plow  shoes,  which  the 
Gilmores  made  for  the  West,  were  sohd  vamps  and  had  to  be 
crimped  like  a  boot,  but  had  goring  on  the  side  like  the  Congress 
shoe.  Otherwise  it  was  unlike  the  Congress  or  Quincy  shoe,  for  it 
was  of  heavier  stock  and  had  no  fancy  stitching.    The  firm  was 

'  In  the  Superintendent  and  Foreman  of  October  27,  1896,  the  writer  of  an 
article  on  Lyman  R.  Blake  said:  "The  story  of  Lyman  R.  Blake,  the  inventor, 
when  written  by  one  who  is  able  to  write  it  as  it  should  be  written,  will  read  like  a 
powerful  romance.  With  almost  no  experience  as  a  machinist,  he  was  yet  a  wonder- 
ful mechanic.  In  Mr.  Blake's  first  machine  the  horn  was  stationar>'  and  would  not 
sew  around  the  heel  and  toe;  these  parts  were  nailed,  but  before  Blake  met  McKay 
he  had  constructed  a  second  machine,  in  which  the  whirl  was  operated  by  a  beveled 
gear,  practically  the  same  as  today.  It  is  one  of  the  remarkable  things  in  mechanical 
invention,  that  a  machine  which  finally  proved  to  be  of  so  much  value  to  the  world 
was  practically  perfect  in  every  essential  when  it  came  from  the  hand  of  the  orig- 
inal inventor."    See  Appendi.x  XXVI. 


112     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

also  doing  a  large  trade  in  Balmorals,  or  Bals,  for  both  South- 
em  and  Western  markets.  This  was  the  output  of  the  Gilmore 
factory  which  was  the  sort  of  building  that  seemed  to  mark  the 
coming  of  the  Factory  System  into  the  boot  and  shoe  industry. 

New  Lynn  Factories  and  their  Output  in  i860 

Lynn  ^  shoe  manufacturers  had  also  been  active  in  building 
substantial  new  factories  of  brick  or  wood.  A  ten-hour  system 
had  gone  into  effect  and  bells  ringing  at  6.00  p.m.  put  an  end  to 
the  working  day.  By  the  returns  of  the  United  States  Census  of 
i860,  Lynn  was  manufacturing  boots  and  shoes  to  a  higher  value 
($4,750,000)  than  any  city  in  the  United  States  except  Phila- 
delphia, whose  output  a  year  was  valued  at  $5,500,000.'  Haver- 
hill was  a  close  third  with  a  value  of  $4,000,000.  These  three 
cities,  together  with  New  York  City,  made  one-fifth  of  the  total 
value  of  shoes  and  boots  in  the  United  States  in  i860.  This  total 
was  given  in  the  Report  on  Boot  and  Shoe  Manufacture  ^  as 
$91,891,498.  To  produce  boots  and  shoes  to  this  value  123,029 ' 
persons  were  engaged  in  different  parts  of  the  United  States, 
working  in  12,487  establishments,  and  using  a  capital  of  $23,358,- 
527.  They  consumed  that  year  raw  materials  worth  $42,729,649. 
This  total  product  of  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  in  the  United 
States  was  seventy  per  cent  above  that  of  1850.  New  England's 
share  in  the  number  of  establishments^  devoted  to  this  shoe 
industry  was  2439.^ 

^  Lynn  adopted  a  city  form  of  government  in  1850.  Her  population  was  then 
14,257.  In  1852,  Swampscott,  and  in  1853,  Nahant,  were  set  off  as  separate  towns, 
and  yet  there  had  been  a  large  enough  increase  in  population  in  the  decade  to  make 
Lynn's  population  in  i860  number  19,083.  In  1875,  the  population  had  grown  to 
32,600;  in  the  two  decades  from  1855  to  1875,  thirty-eight  new  shoe  factories  were 
built.  ^  U.  S.  Census  of  i860,  p.  Ixviii. 

^  More  than  one-twelfth  of  the  operatives  engaged  in  all  manufactures.  Only  in 
agriculture  were  more  hands  employed. 

*  Most  of  these  were  probably  Central  Shops.  Only  a  few  of  them  could  be 
termed  factories  in  the  modern  sense. 

'  The  Middle  West  states  had 5412 

The  Western  "         "      3175 

The  Southern  "        "     1365 

The  Pacific  "        «     96 

Cf.  U.  S.  Census  of  1850,  p.  Ixxiii. 


FACTORY  STAGE  II3 

New  England  Boot  a^id  Shoe  Manufacture  in  i860 

The  New  England  boot  and  shoe  shops  and  factories  gave  em- 
ployment to  nearly  $11,000,000  of  capital  out  of  the  twenty- 
three  millions  invested  in  the  shoe  industry  throughout  the 
United  States.  They  employed  52,010  males,  and  22,282  females, 
out  of  the  total  of  123,029  employed  in  the  whole  United  States 
in  boot  and  shoe  making.  The  product  of  their  labor  was  $54,- 
818,148,  or  nearly  sixty  per  cent  of  the  whole  value  of  boot  and 
shoe  making  in  the  whole  country.  The  average  value  of  boots 
and  shoes  made  in  each  of  the  New  England  establishments  was 
$22,475  per  year. 

Massachusetts  Boot  and  Shoe  Manufacture  in  i860 

Of  all  the  2439  manufactories  1  in  New  England,  more  than  one- 
half,  i.  e.,  1354,  establishments  were  in  Massachusetts.  They 
employed  over  $9,000,000  of  capital,  43,068  male  and  19,215 
female  hands.  The  product  of  their  labor  was  $46,230,529,  having 
increased  its  value  91.8  per  cent  since  1850.  The  average  capital 
of  Massachusetts  establishments  was  $6655;  the  average  number 
of  hands  46;  the  average  value  of  the  annual  product  $34,143. 
The  three  Massachusetts  counties  of  Essex,  Worcester,  and  Ply- 
mouth, together  made  boots  and  shoes  to  the  value  of  more  than 
one-third  the  total  product  of  the  United  States. 

Boot  and  Shoe  Matiufacture  in  the  Brookfields  in  i860 

The  largest  single  establishment  for  the  manufacture  of  boots 
and  shoes  in  the  United  States  was  in  Worcester  County  of  Massa- 
chusetts. It  was  owned  and  run  by  the  Batchellers  in  North 
Brookfield,  and  manufactured  to  the  value  of  more  than  $750,000 
a  year.  It  was  the  largest  of  five  factories  belonging  to  the  same 
proprietors,  which  together  made  in  i860  more  than  1,000,000 
pairs  of  boots  and  shoes.  The  figures  showing  the  business  of  this 
firm  in  its  infancy  (1830-31),  have  already  been  given,-  and  those 
for  1875  will  be  given  later  when,  a  decade  and  a  half  of  growth 
having  been  explamed,  and  its  development  watched,  the  figures 

'  Cf.  U.  S.  Census  of  i860,  p.  Ixxiii.  »  Cf.  Appendix  XVII. 


114     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

will  seem  less  abnormal  than  if  they  were  given  here  so  close  to 
the  humbler  ones  of  i860.  In  the  neighboring  town  of  Brookfield 
Centre,  a  prosperous  though  less  extensive  manufacture  of  boots 
and  shoes  was  being  carried  on  in  those  same  decades  first  by  the 
firm  of  Kimball  and  Robinson,^  and  later  by  Henry  E.  Twitchell. 
Their  market,  like  the  Gilmore's,  was  the  South  and  the  Middle 
West.  They  made  heavy  brogans  for  the  southern  plantations 
and  boots,  both  russet  and  black,  for  firms  in  St.  Louis,  Detroit, 
and  other  cities  east  of  Chicago.  For  the  distribution  of  the 
product  in  the  6o's,  we  have  the  firm's  order  book  kept  from 
February,  1861,  to  November,  1865.  For  the  daily  details  of  their 
business  in  the  earlier  years  of  the  factory  organization,  we  have  a 
ledger  covering  dates,  December  10,  1858  to  June  29,  i860. 
These  show  that  here  the  transition  from  the  large  employ  of 
domestic  workers  for  both  uppers  and  bottoms  to  factory  workers 
with  machines  was  slower  in  coming  to  Brookfield  than  to  the 
Lynn,  Raynham,  or  Randolph  boot  and  shoe  centres,  for  all 
through  these  years  there  were  hundreds  of  pairs  of  uppers  given 
out  to  Brookfield  women  to  bind  at  home.  The  business  of  De- 
cember II,  1858,  and  that  of  June  27,  i860,  are  much  alike  as  far 
as  progress  in  factory  organization  is  concerned. ^  Though  sepa- 
rated by  one  and  a  half  years,  the  first  and  last  pages  of  this 
ledger  show  little  difference  in  the  industrial  organization  used  by 
the  firm,  and  both  might  have  belonged  to  an  earlier  decade. 
Evidently  the  same  kind  of  brogans  and  plow  shoes  were  being 
bound  and  bottomed  by  the  same  domestic  workers  who  had  been 
employed  by  the  firm  of  Kimball  and  Robinson  for  years.  Other 
pages  in  their  ledgers,  taken  at  random,  while  they  show  little  or 
no  signs  of  the  Factory  System  already  in  use  in  other  manu- 
factories of  Massachusetts,  suggest  a  reason  why  this  delay  had 
come.  Take,  for  example,  pages  of  the  sales  book  to  show  the 
kinds  and  prices  of  boots  and  shoes  manufactured  by  this  firm.* 
Most  of  them  were  of  the  old  low-priced,  roughly  made  brogan 

1  This  firm  began  as  the  Batcheller  firm  did  in  1828.    For  many  years  they 
curried  leather  brought  over  from  Grafton,  a  tannery  centre  near  by. 
^  See  Appendix  XXIV  for  the  Kimball  and  Robinson  papers. 
=>  Ibid. 


FACTORY  STAGE  II5 

type.  The  higher  priced  ones  (even  these  were  seUing  at  whole- 
sale for  less  than  a  dollar),  were  called  boots,  probably  not  even 
short-legged,  for  no  mention  is  made  of  crimping,^  but  what  we 
should  call  a  high  shoe  today.  For  the  higher  priced  ones,  some- 
thing more  than  mere  essential  processes  were  necessary,  and  the 
pages  from  December,  1858,  to  January  22,  1859,  have  carried 
almost  weekly  entries  of  work  done  by  two  men  on  different 
processes.  Charles  Hobbs  was  stitching  and  buffing  a  relatively 
small  number  of  cases,  varying  from  10  to  24,  at  the  rate  of  65 
cents  a  case  for  stitching,  and  90  cents  a  case  for  buffing.  Philo 
Walker  was  dressing  boots,  sometimes  44  cases  at  a  time,  at  the 
rate  of  30  cents  a  case.  Whether  these  men  owned  the  necessary 
tools  and  machines  and  worked  at  home,  or  were  hired  to  work  in 
the  shop,  as  Crocker  had  been  at  Raynham,  and  Fletcher  was 
in  Randolph,  and  Leach  at  Eddy  and  Leach's  in  Middleboro, 
there  is  no  evidence  in  the  books.  One  man  by  the  name  of  J.  B. 
Bellows  occurs  repeatedly  by  name  as  bottoming  boots  at  the 
rate  of  $8.50  for  60  pair  (one  case).  On  December  20,  1858,  he  is 
paid  also  for  i6j  D.  work,  $24.75.  '^his  looks  like  work  in  the 
factory  at  a  day  wage  instead  of  piece  work,  netting  him  $1.50  a 
day.  No  entry  appears  of  pay  -  for  cutting  leather,  either  upper  or 
sole  leather,  so  that  it  would  appear  that  the  two  members  of  the 
firm  were  cutting  the  sides  of  leather  bought  by  them  in  rela- 
tively large  lots.^ 

The  reasons  then  for  the  delay  in  introducing  factory  methods, 
or  for  the  late  survival  of  the  domestic  system  here  in  Brookfield 
in  the  firm  of  Kimball  and  Robinson,  were  (i)  that  they  were  mak- 
ing a  cheap  shoe,  of  no  radically  new  pattern;  (2)  the  firm  itself 
was  an  old  one,  the  members  used  to  old  ways  of  doing  business ; 

'  Crimping  or  forming  is  a  necessary  process  in  making  boots  proper,  whether 
short  or  long-legged. 

2  It   may   be  that   the   entry   of    Dec.    18,    1858,  of   $323.00  paid  Emmons 
Twitchell  was  for  services  as  cutter  or  as  bookkeeper.  The  latter  is  more  probable, 
for  he  was  their  bookkeeper  at  a  later  date. 
'  December  21,  1858 

686    ft.  insoling  were  bought  @  i8c $123.48 

386}  ft.  Calfskin  ®  80 309.20 

6s8    ft.  CiUskin  ((it  S00.08 

4533    ft.  sole  lea.  ©23  1046.7s 


1 1 6     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

(3)  they  were  public  spirited  and  had  a  strongly  paternal  feeling  * 
for  the  old  shoe  workers  in  their  village  who  would  lose  work  by 
the  introduction  of  new  methods  and  the  new  machinery  in  vogue 
in  other  factories  and  other  towns.  The  firm,  however, probably  as 
a  concession  to  some  younger  men  in  the  office  or  factory,  was 
trying  out  a  few  new  processes  in  connection  with  higher  priced 
boots  which  they  put  on  the  market  occasionally.  No  signal  bell 
has  ever  told  manufacturers  when  to  relinquish  their  hold  on  the 
old,  and  to  introduce  more  efficient  methods  of  production.  We 
have  seen  the  feverish  eagerness  of  some,  the  incomprehensible 
slowness  of  other  firms  of  our  own  day  in  adopting  scientific  man- 
agement. 

New  blood  came  into  this  same  factory  with  a  new  firm  in  the 
early  6o's,  and  even  the  printed  headlines  of  account  books  show 
energy  and  appreciation  of  up-to-date  methods.  Pages  were  so 
ruled  that  time  was  saved  not  only  in  entering  stock  given  out  to 
be  bottomed  and  bound,  but  also  in  later  reference,  a  mere 
glance  telling  the  bookkeeper  or  firm  the  whole  story.  Sample 
pages  are  printed  in  Appendix  XXV.  They  show  a  transition 
during  1864,  when,  though  the  same  old  printed  headings  are 
used,  the  processes  mentioned,  like  stitching  and  binding,  are  done 
in  the  factory,  and  no  longer  by  domestic  workers.  By  that  time 
the  old  Hobinson  and  Kimball  firm  had  sold  out  to  Henry  E. 
Twitchell,  who  had  been  their  bookkeeper  just  previous  to  the 
sale.  An  order  book  for  1861-65  gives  the  record  of  shipping, 
which  shows  not  only  variety  of  customers  and  product,  but  the 
wide  distribution  of  the  same,  and  the  means  of  transportation 
in  most  cases.    In  Appendix  XXV,  several  pages  are  reprinted. 

Efect  of  the  Civil  War  on  the  Boot  and  Shoe  Manufacture 

Though  the  Twitchell  books  cover  the  years  of  the  Civil  War, 
there  seems  no  evidence  in  them  of  a  decrease  in  demand  for 

1  Such  a  feeling  existed  as  late  as  1910  in  North  Brookfield,  when  one  of  the 
members  of  the  late  Batcheller  firm  pointed  out  the  inscription  on  the  public  library 
of  the  village  with  pride.  It  showed  the  donors  of  the  building  to  be  two  humble 
citizens,  man  and  wife,  who  had  earned  and  saved  all  that  money  during  a  long  life 
time  of  binding  and  bottoming  shoes  for  that  one  firm. 


FACTORY  STAGE  II7 

slave  shoes  nor  of  any  work  on  army  boots,  nor  does  such  evi- 
dence appear  for  any  other  Brookfield  factory.  It  was  perhaps  in 
eastern  Massachusetts  that  the  greatest  amount  of  work  was  done 
on  army  shoes  with  the  most  far-reaching  results. 

In  the  Randolph  Centre,  i86i-6§ 

Large  orders,  requiring  many  laborers  to  fill,  coming  at  the 
same  time  as  the  great  demand  for  soldiers  taken  from  the  number 
of  men  who  had  been  boot  and  shoe  workers,  called  into  the 
Randolph  factories  and  those  of  nearby  towns  younger  men  and 
more  women  than  ever  before,  to  take  the  place  of  the  men  who 
had  been  stitchers  on  uppers.  The  hope  of  cash  payments  for  these 
large  army  orders,  and  the  need  of  speed,  induced  a  more  rapid 
introduction  of  the  McKay  machine  for  bottoms  than  could  prob- 
ably have  come  naturally  in  peace.  The  stitch  of  the  McKay 
machine  was  not  as  yet  perfected,  and  a  demand  for  old  hand- 
sewed  instead  of  pegged  boots  brought  out  old  retired  shoe- 
makers ^  who  organized  into  a  sort  of  gang  firm,  took  a  building 
for  a  factory  and  got  better  prices  for  their  work  than  they  had 
ever  enjoyed. 

Ahington  and  Army  Shoes 

It  was  as  interesting  as  it  was  natural  that  Abington,  the  home 
of  Blake,^  the  inventor  of  the  McKay  machine,  should  have  been 
the  boot  and  shoe  centre  which  made  on  McKay  machines  more 
than  one-half  of  the  army  shoes  provided  for  the  Northern  soldiers 
during  the  Civil  War.  Mr.  Seth  Bryant,^  a  shoe  manufacturer 
living  at  Joppa,  a  part  of  East  Bridgewater,  took  some  samples  of 
suitable  army  shoes,  sewed  by  the  McKay  machine,  to  Washing- 
ton, to  present  to  Mr.  Edwin  M.  Stanton,  the  Secretary  of  War. 
A  contract  was  awarded  to  Bryant  on  condition  that  he  guarantee 
the  sewing,''  and  this  he  promised  to  do  by  stamping  his  name  on 

'  "  Stitching  aloft "  was  done  by  this  band  of  old  retired  shoeworkers  in  Randolph 
in  the  shop  of  Hiram  Alden,  Sr.  Only  older  men  knew  the  stitch.  Younger  ones 
were  used  to  pegging.  *  See  Appendix  XXVI. 

'  Cf.  Seth  Br>'ant's  Shoe  and  Leather  Trade  of  the  Last  Hundred  Years,  pp. 
77-78. 

*  Probably  this  was  the  very  first  machine  sewed  sole  the  Secretar>'  of  War  had 
ever  seen  or  heard  of. 


Il8     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

every  pair  of  shoes  if  the  Secretary  of  War  would  in  turn  promise 
to  issue  an  order  that  no  shoes  for  army  use  should  be  accepted 
without  their  manufacturer's  name  stamped  on  them.  This  kept 
the  product  up  to  the  standard,  not  only  in  Abington,  but  also  in 
Philadelphia,  where  most  of  the  other  half  of  the  army  shoes  were 
made.  The  contract  ^  did  not  prove  entirely  profitable  financially 
to  the  Massachusetts  producers  for  several  reasons.  In  the  first 
place,  the  government  was  very  slow  in  making  payments  and 
the  contractors  were  forced  to  sell  their  vouchers  at  ten  or  fifteen 
per  cent  discount.  In  the  second  place,  the  stipulation  had  been 
made  that  all  army  and  navy  shoes  should  be  made  of  "oak 
leather."  The  price  of  oak  tanned  leather  was  twenty  cents  per 
pound  higher  than  the  hemlock  leather,  which  was  common  in  the 
Massachusetts  markets.  Pennsylvania  had  oak  bark  as  a  natural 
resource  and  derived  relatively  greater  benefits  from  the  require- 
ments not  only  in  buying  its  stock  easily  and  cheaply,  but  in 
being  the  market  in  which  the  Massachusetts  shoe  manufac- 
turers 2  were  forced  to  buy.  The  supply  of  oak  leather  in  the 
whole  country  proved  insufficient  before  the  war  was  over,  and  a 
substitute,  called  Union  leather,  treated  with  an  oak  stain,  was 
used.  In  the  third  place,  the  United  States  turned  several  thou- 
sand pairs  back  on  Bryant's  hands  at  the  end  of  the  war.  This  was 
said  to  be  a  loss  for  which  there  was  no  redress. 

It  is  certain,  however,  that  the  300,000  pairs  of  army  shoes  had 
kept  shoemakers  in  the  Abington  region  busily  employed  and  had 
proved  an  effective  establishment  and  advertisement  of  the 
McKay  machine. 

Brockton  and  the  Development  of  the  "Good  Low-Priced 

Shoe" 

Brockton,  as  Abington's  near  neighbor,  does  not  seem  to  have 
entered  upon  the  army  shoe  enterprise  nor  any  large  use  of  the 

1  Bryant  had  a  contract  at  the  opening  of  the  first  bid  in  New  York  and  the  last 
bid  in  Philadelphia. 

^  Bryant  paid  60  cents  a  pound  in  Philadelphia  for  the  oak  leather,  and  one  con- 
tract cost  him  $10,000  more  for  the  oak  than  he  would  have  had  to  pay  for  hem- 
lock. 


FACTORY  STAGE  II9 

McKay  machine.  Its  start  and  reputation  for  the  shoe  industry 
came  later,'  with  its  creation  of  a  "good  low-priced  shoe"  by 
Mr.  Daniel  S.  Howard,  who  "knew  just  how  to  put  every  stitch 
and  peg  into  a  shoe  where  it  would  do  the  most  good."  He  got 
into  touch  with  Fisher  and  Baldwin  in  New  York  before  1850, 
when  they  were  looking  for  a  good,  though  a  cheaper  shoe  than  the 
Philadelphia  and  Newark  firms  were  manufacturing.  They  in 
turn  told  Bryant,  of  Abington,  that  his  neighbor  in  Brockton 
could  "make  the  best  shoe  for  one  dollar  of  any  man  in  the  coun- 
try." Thereupon  Bryant,  who  had  a  large  Boston  wholesale  shoe 
trade,  told  Daniel  S.  Howard  "  to  put  100  cents  into  a  shoe  and 
show  it  to  him."  Bryant  closed  a  bargain  with  him  immediately 
for  1000  cases,  and  as  he  told  in  later  years,  he  got  the  lead  in  the 
trade  in  New  York  City,  selling  5000  to  6000  cases  right  along  of 
Howard's  shoes.  By  that  time,  Howard  ^  was  "making  more 
shoes  than  all  the  rest  of  Brockton  manufacturers.  That  estab- 
lished Brockton's  reputation  for  making  good  low-priced  shoes." 
By  the  time  that  Mr.  Howard  gave  up  his  business  in  1888, 
Brockton  had  developed  this  style  of  shoe  by  long  strides  under 
the  Douglas  and  the  Walkover  regime,  and  in  1890  there  were  75 
shoe  factories  in  Brockton,  including  Campello,  but  that  date  is 
not  within  the  Umits  of  this  investigation. 

Lynn's  Shoe  Factories,  1865-75 

Meanwhile,  in  Lynn,  the  introduction  of  factory  methods  came 
more  rapidly  and  steadily  than  anywhere  else.  The  development 
of  factory  organization  was  followed  by  the  outward  sign,  /.  e., 
power  machinery.  The  finer  product,  the  greater  chance  for  nice 
machine  work  done  by  women  on  uppers,  had  led  to  the  introduc- 
tion of  power  machines  for  uppers,  even  before  the  McKay  was 

'  Arza  Keith  and  his  brother  had  started  shoe  manufacture  in  a  small  way  in 
1824,  in  South  Bridpewater,  which  eventually  turned  —  under  his  grandson,  George 
E.  Keith  —  into  the  "Walkover"  establishment  of  today.  Colonel  Southard,  Mark 
Faxon  and  the  Fields  were  manufacturing  in  Bridgewater  in  a  "small  plodding 
way"  when  Daniel  S.  Howard  began  business  in  1848. 

'  Bryant  visited  59  factories  in  Brockton  in  1884,  and  reported  that  their  aggre- 
gate product  amounted  to  $12,208,332,  as  against  Lynn's  aggregate  of  $25,000,000 
for  that  year. 


I20     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

introduced.  Steam  power  was  put  into  John  Wooldredge's  ^  shoe 
factory  as  motive  power  as  early  as  1858,  to  run  a  machine  for 
making  heels.  Johnson  says  that  by  1865,  the  introduction  of 
steam  became  general  in  all  the  large  shoe  factories  in  Lynn,  and 
that  the  "Revolution  in  the  shoe  business"  was  completed  by 
that  year. 

The  Revolution  in  the  shoe  business  occurred  during  the  ten  years  ending 
1865.  From  1855.  or  a  little  later,  the  workmen  began  to  leave  the  "little 
shop"  to  work  in  the  factories  of  the  manufacturers;  and  in  a  few  years, 
vacant  shops  were  seen  all  over  the  city,  until  most  of  them  were  trans- 
formed into  hen  houses  or  coal  pens,  or  were  moved  and  joined  to  some 
house  to  make  a  snug  little  kitchen.^ 

By  1880,  the  division  of  labor  in  Lynn  factories  was  so  marked 
that  Johnson  Ksted  the  workers.  Probably  his  Hsts  would  agree 
with  those  which  could  have  been  made  by  other  up-to-date 
factory  superintendents  in  1875.  They  are  interesting  when  com- 
pared not  only  to  the  possible  Hsts  for  181 5,  but  vdth  those  of 
1915,  when  the  division  is  so  much  more  minute  and  the  processes 
so  much  more  numerous.^ 

Sole  cutting: 

1.  stripper.  3.   sorter. 

2.  sole  cutter.  4.   tier-up. 

Upper  stock  cutting : 

5.  outside  cutter.  7.   trimming  cutter. 

6.  lining  cutter.  8.  dier-out  (of  small  parts). 

Stitching  on  uppers: 

9.  lining  maker.  15.  turner. 

10.  closer.  16.  top-stitcher. 

11.  seam- rubber.  17.  button-hole  cutter. 

12.  back-stayer.  18.  corder. 

13.  front-stayer.  19.  vamper. 

14.  closer-on.  20.  button  sewer-on. 

Lasting  and  bottoming: 

21.  stock  fitter.  24.  stitcher.  ^ 

22.  laster.  25.  beater-out. 

23.  sole  layer.  26.  trimmer. 

'  This  is  the  same  man  who  introduced  the  first  sewing  machine  into  a  Lynn 
shoe  shop. 

2  Johnson:  Sketches  of  Lynn,  p.  341. 
'  Ibid.,  pp.  344-348,  and  Appendix  I. 


FACTORY  STAGE  121 

Lasting  and  bottoming  (continued). 

27.  setter.  31-   buffer. 

28.  liner.  32.   burnisher. 

29.  nailer.  33-   channeller,  and  sometimes*  a 

30.  shaver.  channel  turner. 

This  list  of  operators  in  the  average  shoe  factory  suggests  the 
number  of  machines  considered  necessary  for  equipment  by  the 
time  the  McKay  Sewing  Machine  for  bottoming  was  on  the 
market.  The  question  of  fixed  capital,  which  used  to  be  a  small 
one  compared  with  that  of  circulating  capital  in  the  shoe  industry, 
now  became  prominent  enough  to  be  puzzling,  and  likely  to  be 
prohibitory  to  new  enterprises,  undertaken  on  such  amounts  of 
capital  as  the  wage  earning  shoemakers  had  saved  and  were  ready 
to  venture. 

The  Royalty  System  an  McKay  Sewing  Machines 

Colonel  McKay,  as  he  watched  the  rapid  increase  in  demand  for 
his  machine  for  which  competing  shoe  firms  all  felt  the  need,  by  the 
late  6o's  and  early  70's,  realized  that  sudden  unexpected  wealth 
was  possible  and  probable.  With  a  greater  vision  than  most  men 
of  his  time,  he  saw  three  things  clearly:  (i)  if  the  manufacturers 
were  stocked  up  too  rapidly  with  the  McKay  machine  before  it 
could  be  perfected,  that  the  way  would  be  blocked  to  selling  to 
them  the  later,  improved  proc^uct;  (2)  that  energetic  but  poor 
would-be  entrepreneurs  in  the  shoe  business  could  not  hope  to  start 
manufacturing  with  the  new  cost  of  soling  machines  added  to  that 
of  factory  equipment  and  stock  outlay;  (3)  that  a  steady  smaller 
revenue  for  a  long  stretch  of  years  ahead  would  be  even  more 
beneficial  in  the  long  run  than  sudden  large  amounts  from  imme- 
diate sales.  McKay,  therefore,  determined  not  to  sell  outright 
any  of  his  output  of  sewing  machines.   He  made  it  known  that  he 

*  Johnson  added  that  "Boys  usually  i>erform  these  minor  parts.  ...  In  some 
of  the  manufactories,  the  nailing  and  shaving  can  be  done  by  a  McKay  '  nailer  and 
shaver.'  A  boy  sets  the  nails,  a  single  stroke  of  the  machine  fastens  them,  and  a 
circular  motion  of  the  machine  shaves  the  heel  with  geometrical  exactness  at  one  cut, 
and  in  an  instant  of  time.  The  boys  who  perform  these  minor  parts  gain  a  nimble- 
ness  of  manipulation  that  gives  them  an  expertness  hardly  possible  to  be  gained  by 
older  hands."  Johnson's  Sketches  of  Lynn,  p.  348. 


122     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

would  lease  them  to  manufacturers  on  easy  terms,  at  the  cost  to 
them  of  one  to  five  cents  for  each  pair  stitched.  A  numbering 
device  was  added  to  each  machine  to  count  the  pairs  as  they  were 
sewed.  McKay  completed  this  new  invention  of  a  leasing  system 
for  machines  by  selHng  royalty-stamps  to  facilitate  the  payment 
of  the  royalties.  The  revenue  of  the  McKay  Machine  Company 
rose  to  $750,000  a  year,  it  was  claimed,  and  the  system  lasted 
until  the  fundamental  patents  on  the  McKay  Sewing  Machine 
had  expired. 

Factories  in  Brookfield  and  the  Contract  System 

Even  with  the  introduction  of  similar  factory  methods  of  or- 
ganization, identical  machinery  and  processes,  there  was  oppor- 
tunity for  individual  firms  to  rival  their  competitors  by  unique 
details  or  minor  systems  of  organization  in  the  boot  and  shoe  in- 
dustry. An  interesting  and  unique  device  in  factory  organization 
was  the  contract  system  tried  by  the  E.  and  A.  H.  Batcheller  firm 
in  North  Brookfield.  Mr.  Sumner  Holmes,  who  was  their  fore- 
man in  the  bottoming  room  for  many  years,  tells  the  experience 
of  this  contract  system  which  was  "such  a  good  thing"  for  the 
various  contractors  that  the  firm  decided,  at  the  end  of  two  years, 
to  assume  once  more  the  risks  which  led  to  such  large  profits,  and 
all  the  contractors  willy  nilly  were  reduced  again  to  foremen  of 
their  various  departments  on  salaries.^  He  does  not  tell  whether 
these  men  as  foremen  used  the  same  energy  and  brain  power  for 
the  firm  that  they  did  for  themselves  while  contractors.  After  that 
Sumner  Holmes,  as  foreman,  took  out  for  his  department  large 
sums  ^  each  month  for  the  firm's  pay  roll,  which  give  an  idea  of  the 
business  done  by  this  firm  in  the  70's.  The  whole  set  of  figures  for 
the  firm's  business  for  1870  is  given  in  Appendix  XXVII,  to  show 
its  volume  and  departments.  The  firm  was  producing  stock  to  the 

'  The  cutting  department  was  never  put  under  the  contract  system  even  when 
nearly  every  other  department  was. 
*  For  example, 

August,       1869 $21,172.86 

October,       1869 20,868.99 

March,         1870 i3,Si9-7i 

September,  1870 18,232.60 


FACTORY  STAGE  I 23 

amount  of  two  million  dollars  in  a  single  year.  One  department  of 
their  factory,  i.  e.,  bottoming  department,  was  costing  them 
nearly  a  quarter  of  a  million  for  labor.  Their  freight  cost  them  for 
one  year  about  fifteen  thousand,  and  teaming  five  and  a  half 
thousand  dollars.  The  account  of  their  deahngs  with  the  Boston 
and  Albany  Railroad  ^  alone  gives  an  idea  of  the  proportions  which 
the  E.  and  A.  Batcheller  shoe  manufacturing  business  had  as- 
sumed. The  town  of  North  Brookfield  bonded  themselves  for 
$90,000,  and  paid  it  in  ten  years,  for  building  the  spur  track  from 
East  Brookfield.  Of  this  amount  the  firm  of  Batcheller  paid 
$80,000  and  individuals  in  the  town  put  in  the  other  $10,000, 
nearly  all  savings.  The  Boston  and  Albany  Railroad  leased  the 
track  for  ten  years  at  three  per  cent,  but  the  town  still  owned  it. 
At  the  end  of  the  ten  years,  the  town  leased  it  again  for  a  fifty- 
year  period.^ 

In  1870,  the  firm  had  a  much  longer  Hst  of  concerns  from  which 
they  bought  stock  than  in  1830  (See  Appendix  XVII).  This  list  ^ 
shows  the  development  of  stock  itself,  and  of  alhed  industries  in 
the  boot  and  shoe  industry  by  1875.  To  organize  and  administer 
a  business  like  this,  a  man  needed  a  different  training  from  that  of 
a  shoe  manufacturer  in  the  Domestic  System  days  in  the  first  half 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  Mr.  Francis  Batcheller,  who  treasures 
the  books  of  the  firm  from  1831  to  1875,  went  into  his  father's 
business  in  1876,  when  the  factory  organization  was  passing  into  a 
second,  more  complete  phase. 

Summary  of  the  Development  of  the  Factory  System  in  its 

First  Phase 

The  manufacturers,  to  save  time  and  to  hold  the  markets  by 
prompt  delivery  of  large  orders  in  the  50's,  completed  the  move- 
ment, well  on  its  way  in  the  40's,  of  having  shoe-making  done 

•  See  Appendix  XXV'II. 

2  That  firm  having  gone  out  of  business  and  the  lease  holding  until  1935  makes 
this  spur  track  a  losing  proposition  for  both  freight  and  passengers  to  the  B.  &  A. 
R.  R.  The  passenger  service  is  greatly  lessened  by  rival  transportation  facilities, 
and  yet  by  the  terms  of  the  lease  several  trains  have  to  be  sent  over  the  tracks  each 
day. 

3  See  Appendi.x  XXVII. 


124     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

under  one  roof  under  supervision  in  order  to  meet  competition 
and  the  demands  of  standardizing.  This  is  the  chief  character- 
istic of  the  Factory  Stage  of  the  boot  and  shoe  organization;  it 
had  entered  the  industry  gradually  and  almost  unobserved.  Large 
buildings,  called  "  manufactories,"  and  later  "  factories,"  more 
capital,  larger  supplies  of  stock,  were  the  more  obvious  features 
of  the  growing  boot  and  shoe  trade,  even  in  1855.  In  i860,  steam 
power  was  being  introduced  into  the  larger  manufactories,  making 
the  hand  labor  of  the  domestic  worker  seem  pitifully  slow  in  com- 
parison. By  the  time  the  Goodyear  Welt  machine  was  put  on  the 
market  in  1875,  even  though  people  at  large  realized  only  then  that 
the  Factory  System  had  come  and  the  Domestic  had  gone,^  one 
whole  phase  of  the  Factory  System  had  already  passed.  The  Fac- 
tory System,  which  had  come  in  the  late  50's,  was  the  prevailing 
type  of  organization  during  the  Civil  War.  The  large  orders  of 
shoes  for  the  Union  armies,  added  to  the  scarcity  of  labor,  caused 
by  the  volunteering  and  drafting  of  soldiers,  were  additional  im- 
portant factors  in  urging  the  use  of  machinery  in  general,  and  in 
encouraging  the  trial  of  the  McKay  machine.  During  the  war,  the 
practicabiHty  of  the  McKay  machine  run  by  steam  power  was 
demonstrated,  and  it  was  widely  adopted  during  the  late  6o's. 
More  specializing  came  on  the  part  of  both  shoe  workers  and 
manufacturers.  Some  southern  Massachusetts  towns  made  shoes 
only,  others  boots.    Some  towns  in  the  western  part  of  the  state 

*  The  Massachusetts  Census  for  1875  gives  tables  showing  the  number  and  wages 
of  women  furnished  with  work  to  do  on  boots  and  shoes  at  home  for  the  year  ending 
May  I,  1875.  A  few  are  given  here: 

No.  of                 Total  Yearly  average 

Town                                   women                yearly  wage  of  each 

wage  domestic  worker 

Amesbuiy 4                  $700.00  $175.00 

Lynn S7S                 82,559.00  143.58-f- 

Haverliill  225                20,207.00  89.80+ 

Randolph 39                   i  ,750.00  44. 87  + 

Stoughton    2                     150.00  75.00 

Webster   35                   1,200.00  34-28 

No.  Brookfield 6                    690.00  1 15.00 

Braintree i                    300.00  300.00 

These  figures  show  that  there  was  a  marked  difference  among  these  few  domestic 
workers,  either  in  the  amount,  or  regularity,  or  the  quality  of  their  work,  and  also  a 
wide  difference  in  the  completeness  with  which  the  Factory  System  was  adopted  in 
these  old  shoe  manufacturing  centres. 


FACTORY  STAGE  1 25 

made  only  cheap  brogans  for  laborers,  while  others  made  a  finer 
grade  of  shoe  to  be  distributed  by  New  York  jobbers.  The  in- 
creased variety  of  styles  within  this  classification  made  it  neces- 
sary to  dispose  of  stock  while  it  was  in  fashion. 

The  "expansion  tendency"  of  the  decade  after  the  Civil  War, 
led,  as  it  did  in  the  30's,  to  over-speculation.  Shoe  manufacturers 
put  more  money  into  railroad  stock  and  western  lands  than  they 
could  steadily  hold  there,  so  that  when  the  hard  times  of  1873 
came,  many  failures  were  found  in  the  shoe  trade.  Thus  the  first 
phase  of  the  Factory  Stage,  like  the  second  phase  of  the  Domestic 
Stage,  closed  with  a  sense  of  disaster  and  had  again  to  be  followed 
by  a  period  of  recuperation.  The  history  of  the  boot  and  shoe 
industrial  organization  since  1875  makes  the  story  of  the  second 
phase  of  the  Factory  Stage,  which  has  been  characterized  chiefly 
by  an  intensive  system  of  production,  though  in  common  par- 
lance its  chief  characteristic  has  been  the  use  of  the  Goodyear 
Welt  machine.  Competition,  which  has  been  not  only  acute 
but  world-wide,  has  forced  economies  and  heightened  the  chance 
of  loss  on  the  ever-increasing  variety  of  styles  which  the  product 
must  take  to  capture  the  market.  The  insistent  discovery  and  use 
of  by-products,  the  absorption  of  allied  industries  by  some  shoe 
manufacturing  firms,  and  the  greater  reliance  placed  by  others  on 
highly  specialized  allied  industries,'  the  immense  increase  in  the 
size  of  plants  and  of  the  number  of  employees,  have  all  necessi- 
tated the  perfecting  of  the  Factory  System.  The  rise  of  the  "  labor 
problem"  with  the  closely  contested  struggles  with  organized 
labor  has  also  especially  characterized  this  period.  This  central 
phenomenon,  however,  together  with  the  other  factors  of  trans- 
portation, market  organization,  and  finance,  which  have  so  pro- 

'  The  signs  seen  on  buildings  when  one  approaches  a  shoe  manufacturing  centre, 
showing  where  heels,  rands,  counters,  welting,  findings,  patterns,  lasts,  dies,  cartons, 
and  boxes  are  made,  furnish  a  graphic  illustration  of  the  scope  of  allied  industries. 
These  make  possible  what  Marshall  calls  "external  economies"  arising  from  "the 
concentration  of  many  small  businesses  of  a  similar  character  in  particular  locali- 
ties"; the  "subsidiary  trades"  which  grow  up  in  the  locaHty  of  a  large  shoe  indus- 
try, "supplying  it  with  many  implements  and  materials,  organizing  its  traffic,  and 
in  many  ways  conducing  to  the  economy  of  its  material."  Principles  of  Economics, 
pp.  266-271  (6th  I'^dition). 


126     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

foundly  modified  industrial  organization,  are  outside  the  limits  of 
this  investigation  and  must  be  left  for  later  presentation.  The  be- 
ginnings of  such  organization  of  the  workers  on  boots  and  shoes 
before  1875  will  be  traced  in  the  next  chapter,  for  the  labor  prob- 
lem is  even  now,  in  1920,  one  of  the  most  puzzling  and  elemental 
factors  in  the  organization  of  the  boot  and  shoe  industry. 


CHAPTER   VI 

THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  IN  THE  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

I.  Shoemakers  and  some  of  Iheir  European  Prototypes,  1620-1875. 

Workmen  as  Individual  Shoemakers. 

(a)  Introduction;  general  consideration  of  characteristics  and  influences. 

(6)  High  standards  of  life  and  thought  due  to 

1.  leisure  to  think  and  to  read  while  at  work, 

2.  contact  with  all  classes  of  people  as  customers, 

3.  influence  of  legends  and  songs  about  famous  early  shoemakers,  like 
St.  Crispin  and  St.  Hugh. 

(c)  Did  shoemaking  take  more  brains  than  other  crafts  ?  before  introduction 
of  machinery  ?  after  that  ? 

(d)  Some  individual  typical  shoemakers,  and  their  life  history. 

II.  Shoemakers  of  Massachusetts  Organized  in  the  Order  of  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin. 

Object  and  propaganda. 

Name  and  numbers. 

Rites  and  vows;  dues  and  duties. 

Meetings;  e.xternal  and  internal  problems;  grievances  and  strikes;  relations 

with  Grand  Lodges. 

Effects  upon  the  industry. 

Decline  of  the  order. 

in.  Summary  of  Condition  of  Shoemikers  at  the  Close  of  the  First  Factory  Period  in 
1875- 

Except  for  personal  anecdotes,  stories  of  professional  interests 
and  triumphs,  and  generalizations  made  from  interviewing  over  a 
hundred  individual  shoemakers  whose  active  days  closed  in  the 
8o's  or  the  90's,  there  is  little  to  tell  of  the  shoemakers  of  Massa- 
chusetts singly  or  in  organized  groups  before  1875.  Shoemakers 
from  one  end  of  the  state  to  the  other  have  been  not  only  self- 
respecting  and  independent,  but  satisfied  and  proud  over  their 
work.  They  had  outgrown,  as  a  class  in  the  Old  England,  the 
beliefs  in  the  shoemakers'  traditions  and  festive  customs,  but 
they  were  still  bound  in  the  New  England  by  the  teachings  of 
shoemakers  who  were  accustomed  not  only  to  all  the  essential 

127 


128     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

tools  and  processes,  but  also  to  apprenticeship  and  master  work- 
men, to  journeymen  and  bagmen,  either  before  they  settled  this 
country,  or  through  contemporary  papers,  books  and  correspond- 
ence received  here  in  the  eighteenth  century. 

Without  a  knowledge,  however,  of  the  outgrown  customs,  tradi- 
tions, and  vocabulary  of  the  early  English  shoemakers  and  cob- 
blers who  were  the  predecessors  or  contemporaries  of  our  New 
England  shoemakers,  it  is  difficult  to  know  just  how  much  creative 
or  original  power  the  latter  had  or  to  account  for  many  of  their 
habits.  It  was  not  environment  alone,  nor  frontier  and  colonial 
conditions  in  lycx)  or  1800  that  influenced  shoemakers  in  Massa- 
chusetts as  to  master  and  apprentice  and  journeyman  relations; 
^  as  to  bespoke  and  shop  work ;  as  to  treatment  of  "bad  ware ' '  and 
to  open  market  sales.  They  were  repeating  the  acts  and  rehears- 
ing the  opinions  of  other  shoe  workers  in  England. 

From  such  a  book  as  Sparkes  Hall's  History  of  Boots  and  Shoes, 
and  William  Winks'  Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers,  we  can 
gather  facts  about  types  and  characters  which  are  counterparts 
of  shoemakers  in  Massachusetts.  There  have  been  absent- 
minded  shoemakers,  enterprising  shoemakers,  well  educated, 
philosophical  shoemakers  in  both  the  Old  World  and  the  New. 
There  have  been  half- trained  shoemakers,  ''mere  cobblers "  whose 
bad  ware  might  hurt  the  shoe  market,  and  whose  lower  wages 
menace  those  of  the  skilled  workman.  There  were  shoemakers 
working  with  gangs  in  bed  chambers  in  England  as  well  as  New 
England  before  the  entrepreneur  could  afford  to  hire  a  shop. 
There  was  the  witty  shoemaker,  the  political  agitator  cobbler,  the 
preacher  shoemaker  on  English  benches,  as  well  as  in  Massa- 
chusetts. Though  shoemakers  found  an  ally  in  the  poet  Coleridge, 
who  said  that  shoemakers  had  given  to  the  world  a  larger  number 
of  eminent  men  than  any  handicraft,  his  statement  ^  might  be 
offset  by  the  fact  that  "the  sons  of  Crispin  have  certainly  been 
a  very  numerous  class"  not  only  in  modem  shoe  centres,  but  in 
old  England,  and  that,  therefore,  they  might  naturally  "figure 
largely  in  the  lists  of  famous  men." 

*  As  a  boy  studying  at  Christ's  Hospital,  Coleridge  wished  to  be  apprenticed  to 
the  trade  of  shoemaking.   Cf.  Winks:  Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers,  p.  189. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 29 

"It  is  felt  that  something  more  is  required  to  account  for  the  re- 
markable proportion  of  shoemakers  in  the  roll  of  men  of  mark.  In 
addition  to  this,  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  reputation  of 
shoemakers  does  not  depend  entirely  on  their  most  illustrious 
representatives.  They  have,  as  a  class,  a  reputation  which  is  quite 
unique.  The  followers  of  'the  gentle  craft'  have  generally  stood 
foremost  among  artisans  as  regards  inteUigence  and  social  influ- 
ence. Probably  no  class  of  workmen  could,  in  these  respects, 
compete  with  them  fifty  or  a  hundred  years  ago,  when  education 
and  reading  were  not  so  common  as  they  are  now.  Almost  to  a 
man  they  had  some  credit  for  thoughtfulness,  shrewdness,  logical 
skill,  and  debating  power;  and  their  knowledge  derived  from 
books  was  admitted  to  be  beyond  the  average  among  operatives. 
They  were  generally  referred  to  by  men  of  their  own  social  status 
for  the  settlement  of  disputed  points  in  literature,  science,  pohtics, 
or  theology.  Advocates  of  political,  social,  or  religious  reform, 
local  preachers,  Methodist  'class-leaders,'  and  Sunday-school 
teachers,  were  drafted  in  larger  numbers  from  the  fraternity  of 
shoemakers  than  from  any  other  craft. 

"How  are  we  to  account  for  such  facts  as  these?  Is  there  any- 
thing in  the  occupation  of  the  shoemaker  which  is  peculiarly  fa- 
vorable to  habits  of  thought  and  study?  It  would  seem  to  be  so; 
and  yet  it  would  be  difficult  to  show  what  it  is  that  gives  him  an 
advantage  over  all  other  workmen.  The  secret  may  lie  in  the  fact 
that  he  sits  to  his  work,  and,  as  a  rule,  sits  alone;  that  his  occupa- 
tion stimulates  his  mind  without  wholly  occupying  and  absorbing 
its  powers;  that  it  leaves  him  free  to  break  off,  if  he  will,  at  inter- 
vals, and  glance  at  the  book  or  make  notes  on  the  paper  which 
lies  beside  him.  Such  facts  as  these  have  been  suggested,  and  not 
without  reason,  as  helping  us  to  account  for  the  reputation  which 
the  sons  of  Crispin  enjoy  as  an  uncommonly  clever  class  of  men." ' 

Analysis  oj  Characteristic  Traits  of  Shoemakers 

After  all  is  said,  the  high  standard  of  life  and  thought  of  shoe- 
makers 2  in  both  mediaeval  and  modern  times  would  seem  to  lie 

'  William  Edward  Winks:  Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers,  p.  190. 
'  "Shoemakers"  is  used  here  as  distinct  from  modern  factor>'  operatives  on  shoe 
machinery. 


I30     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

in  their  opportunities  and  in  the  ideals  which  influenced  them. 
First  in  the  opportunity  already  suggested  in  having  the  leisure 
to  think,  read,  and  discuss  while  they  were  at  work;  secondly, 
their  contact  as  custom  makers,  while  journeymen,  or  apprentices 
in  their  master's  shop,  with  people  of  all  classes  from  rulers  and 
clergymen  to  poor  artisans.  Even  a  princess  had  to  have  her  shoes 
tried  on  by  the  shoemaker;  the  busiest  governor,  the  most  learned 
judge,  and  the  most  pious  parson  ^  sat  by  the  bench  of  the  shoe- 
maker in  colonial,  and  later  New  England,  long  enough  to  have 
his  foot  measured,  to  order  his  boots  or  shoes,  and  again  to  have 
them  tried  on.  Thirdly,  the  influence  on  their  imagination  and 
actions  of  the  century-old  legends  ^  about  St.  Crispinanus  and  his 
Brother  Crispin,  and  St.  Hugh. 

English  shoemakers  were  stimulated  also  by  the  tales  of  shoe- 
maker-heroes on  the  Continent,  Uke  Gabriel  Cappelini,  the  Italian 
^  painter-shoemaker;  like  Francesco  Brizzio,  of  Bologna,  who 
passed  from  shoemaking  at  twenty  to  learning  design  and  en- 
graving, and  became  an  artist;  or  Jacob  Boehme,  the  German 
mystic  of  Silesia,  all  of  whom  lived  in  the  sixteenth  century. 
Probably  many  a  journeyman  shoemaker  has  been  stirred  into 
an  ambition  for  travel  by  Hans  Sachs,  the  German  poet-shoe- 
maker, born  at  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century,  who  travelled 
as  journeyman,  not  only  to  learn  his  trade  more  perfectly,  but 
also  to  see  the  world.  A  stanza  of  one  of  their  songs,  sung  always 
on  St.  Crispin's  Day,  assured  the  shoemakers  themselves  and 
informed  the  public: 

Our  Ancestors  came  of  a  Royal  Descent : 

Crispiana,  Crispinus,  and  Noble  St.  Hugh, 
Were  all  Sons  of  Kings,  this  is  known  to  be  true.' 

1  It  is  said  that  the  Randolph  ministers  acquired  the  habit  of  talking  over  their 
sermons  and  threshing  out  the  theological  points  at  Bump's  ten-footer,  where  some 
of  the  keenest  theological  discussions  were  common  in  the  50's.  One  old  shoemaker 
told  me  it  was  better  for  the  minister  to  get  "pointers  beforehand"  than  criticism 
afterwards.  Though  this  must  be  taken  for  what  it  is  worth,  it  reveals  a  common 
behef  that  theological  opinions  were  considered  a  rightful  part  of  the  shoemaker's 
life  at  Bump's  shop. 

2  Cf.  Appendix  III  and  IV  and  Appendix  XXX,  XXXI,  and  XXXII. 
'  Cf.  Appendix  XXXIII  where  this  poem  is  printed  in  full. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 3  I 

Legends  like  these  in  the  age  when  they  were  believed  had  a 
strong  influence  which  was  transmitted  in  a  subtle  way  long  after 
incredulity  disposed  of  the  value  of  the  legends  themselves.  Even 
today  in  shoe  cities  where  thousands  of  shoe  factory  hands  are 
seen  going  to  and  from  work,  there  is  a  definite  impression  given  of 
self-respect,  confidence,  well-being,  and  a  high  order  of  intelli- 
gence.' 

Study  of  Individual  Shoemakers  as  Types 

Perhaps  the  review  of  a  few  individual  cases  of  shoemakers  in 
Massachusetts  with  some  reference  to  their  English  counterparts 
or  prototypes  would  serve  as  a  basis  for  the  above  generalizations 
as  to  the  characteristics  and  standards  of  shoemakers.  First  of  all 
we  find  Thomas  Beard  and  Isaac  Rickerman  coming  over  in  1629, 
bringing  a  supply  of  leather  and  lasts,  as  well  as  their  kit,  con- 
fident that  the  new  community  would  need  shoes.  They  had  evi- 
dently been  invited  to  join  the  party  because  they  could  be 
cobblers  as  well  as  farmers.  Beyond  these  initial  facts  of  their 
coming  and  being  given  their  board  and  houseroom  at  the  expense 
of  the  colony  we  have  no  further  news.  No  other  individual  shoe- 
makers except  Philip  Kertland  and  Edmund  Bridges,  who  came 
to  Lynn  soon  after  1630;  and  John  Dagyr,  who  came  to  Lynn  in 
1750,  and  taught  the  shoemakers  in  Lynn  how  to  improve  in  mak- 
ing ladies'  shoes,  have  had  their  advent  from  the  Old  England 
recorded  in  history.  Of  the  shoemakers  born,  raised  and  trained 
in  Massachusetts,  some  few  have  become  really  famous  in  public 
life  for  their  other  work.' 

'  There  is  a  tradition  in  Massachusetts  that  it  takes  a  higher  order  of  skill  and 
understanding  to  operate  in  a  shoe  factory  than  in  a  woolen  mill.  I  do  not  know 
whether  this  could  be  maintained  or  not.  I  do  know  that  a  factory  hand  in  Mas- 
sachusetts resents  being  spoken  of  as  a  mill  hand.  There  used  to  be  exceptions, 
however,  for  in  Lucy  Larcom's  time  in  the  mills  of  Lowell  in  the  30's,  no  keener, 
brighter  minds  were  ever  set  to  daily  toil  than  Lucy  Larcom  and  her  companion 
operatives  in  the  cotton  mills.  The  details  of  their  book  reading,  paper  editing  in 
spare  minutes,  and  of  their  work  as  school  teachers  after  money  was  saved,  are 
very  like  the  story  of  the  shoemakers  on  the  bench  in  olden  times.  Cf.  Lucy 
Larcom's  New  England  Girlhood. 


132     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Roger  Shernmn,  a  Shoemaker  whose  Trade  Knowledge  Helped 
the  Continental  Budget  in  the  Revolutionary  War 

Roger  Sherman,  as  a  Massachusetts  boy/  born  in  Newton  in 
17  2 1  but  brought  up  in  Stoughton,  was  apprenticed  to  a  shoe- 
maker and  worked  at  the  trade  until  he  was  22  years  of  age. 
Meanwhile  he  "received  ^  no  other  education  than  the  ordinary 
country  schools  in  Massachusetts  at  that  period  afforded,  but  he 
was  accustomed  to  sit  at  his  work  with  a  book  before  him  devoting 
every  moment  that  his  eyes  could  be  spared  from  his  shoe- 
making."  In  1743  he  gave  up  shoemaking  for  various  other  occu- 
pations which  allowed  him  even  more  leisure  for  studying  law, 
and  by  1754  he  was  admitted  to  the  law  practice  of  Massachusetts. 
When  he  was  examining  certain  army  accounts  during  the  Revo- 
lutionary War,  he  found  a  contract  for  army  shoes  which  he 
informed  the  committee,  was  "defrauding  the  public  by  exhorbi- 
tant  charges."  This  claim  he  proved  by  specifying  the  cost  of  the 
leather  and  other  materials,  and  of  the  workmanship.  The 
minuteness  with  which  this  was  done,  exciting  some  surprise,  he 
informed  the  committee  that  he  was  by  trade  a  shoemaker,  and 
knew  the  value  of  every  article. 

One  does  not  argue  from  these  facts  that  his  shoemaker's 
training  and  career  made  him  the  great  political  leader  that  he 
became  in  later  years,  but  it  shows  the  stamp  of  man  that  some- 
times sat  on  the  shoemaker's  bench  and  gave  personal  interest  to 
thousands  of  other  shoemakers  who  followed  his  later  public 
career  with  unusual  sympathy.  He  reminds  one  of  a  later  shoe- 
maker, Henry  Wilson  of  Natick,  of  whom  many  details  have  been 
given.^    In  his  public  services,  Roger  Sherman  makes  one  recall 

'  This  Roger  Sherman,  during  his  later  career  as  a  statesman  of  power  and  faith- 
ful service,  was  a  citizen  of  Connecticut,  but  belonged  to  the  United  States  rather 
than  to  any  one  state,  for  he  was  a  signer  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence;  a 
member  of  the  Continental  Congress;  a  delegate  to  the  Convention  which  framed 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  1787;  and  a  Representative  and  then  a 
Senator  in  the  Federal  Congress. 

*  Cf.  Sparks  Hall:  History  of  Boots  and  Shoes  and  Biographical  Sketches,  pp. 
148-155. 

3  Cf.  Ch.  IV,  pp.  68-71. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 33 

Hans  Sachs,  the  German  poet-shoemaker,  who  helped  his  fellow 
countrymen  in  a  time  of  pubHc  unrest  and  danger.  As  a  journey- 
man shoemaker,  he  associated  with  meistersingers  everywhere  he 
went,  and  as  a  master  shoemaker  he  became  a  leader  of  his  gild 
even  while  he  was  composing  poetry.  Having  laid  the  foundation 
for  a  popular  confidence  he  could  be  a  great  help  to  Luther  later 
in  stirring  and  directing  the  simple  people  of  his  land. 

Roger  Sherman  was  not  the  only  shoemaker  in  New  England, 
or  in  Old  England,  who  studied  enough  at  the  bench  to  lay  the 
foundations  of  a  later  professional  or  hterary  career.  Like  Samuel 
Drew  ^  a  shoemaker  metaphysician,  their  English  contemporary, 
Sherman  and  other  shoemakers  in  the  last  quarter  of  the  eight- 
eenth century  and  the  first  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  were  read- 
ing many  many  volumes  of  real  literary,  historical,  or  logical 
merit.  In  Brookfield  we  find  that  a  whole  group  of  shoemakers 
were  active  readers. 

Brookfield  Shoemakers  as  a  Reading  Public 

The  village  folk  of  Brookfield  in  1820  were  readers  generally  and 
had  a  hbrary  that  was  either  a  public  athenaeum  or  a  circulating 
library  owned  as  a  private  venture.^  The  latter  seems  the  more 
likely  for  I  have  the  ledger,  hand-ruled,  but  business-like  in  ap- 
pearance, kept  for  the  years  1819  to  1828.  The  books  were 
generally  registered  merely  by  numbers,  yet  occasionally  by 
name,  i.  e.,  third  volume  of  U.  S.  History,  or  Lafayette's  Mem- 
oirs ^  or  Humphrey  CHnker,  Vol.  I. 

Whether  the  readers  were  too  busy  to  read  often,  or  too  slow  at 
this  labor  to  work  rapidly,  I  do  not  know,  but  the  books  were  in- 
variably kept  out  from  two  to  three  months  at  a  time.  Mr. 
Amasa  Blanchard  took  books  more  regularly  and  frequently 
than  anyone  else  in  the  village,  generally  returning  one  at  the  end 
of  two  weeks. 

>  See  Appendix  XXVIII. 

^  Apparently  by  Skinner  and  Ward,  but  I  cannot  be  sure,  for  the  flyleaf  of  the 
account  book  does  not  tell,  although  the  book  itself  was  given  to  me  with  all  of  that 
firm's  regular  account  books  and  is  identical  in  style  and  handwriting. 

'  This  book  was  in  greatest  demand  in  1825,  just  after  Lafayette's  visit  to  this 
country. 


134     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Mr.  Daniel  Walker,  uncle  or  great  uncle  of  Francis  Walker,  the 
economist,  was  reading  the  Power  of  Sympathy,  Vol.  I,  from 
January  15  to  2 2d,  and  Vol.  II  from  January  2 2d  to  February 
4th.  On  that  day  he  took  Modern  Europe,  Vol.  I,  and  next 
month  he  read  Plutarch. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  know  if  any  of  these  New  England 
reading  shoemakers  at  Brookfield  ever  read  the  works  of  their 
English  contemporary,  Samuel  Drew,  who  made  both  boots  and 
books. ^  Certainly  Mr.  Walker  would  have  found  a  kindred  spirit 
in  him. 

Paul  Hathaway,  the  Belated  Itinerant  Shoemaker 

Paul  Hathaway,  the  "first  shoemaker"  of  Middleboro,  repre- 
sents an  interesting  local  survival  of  customs,  and  the  transition 
from  the  itinerant  shoemaker  to  the  custom-maker  in  his  own 
shop.  His  town,  settled  in  1663,  retained  until  comparatively 
late  its  frontier  conditions,  for  even  in  1796  people  were  employ- 
ing an  itinerant  cobbler.  In  1798  Paul  Hathaway  decided  to 
make  people  come  to  him  with  their  leather  and  let  him  save  his 
time.  He  Uttle  suspected,  I  imagine,  that  in  another  Massa- 
chusetts town  as  early  as  1644  other  shoemakers  had  prevailed 
upon  the  General  Court  to  make  all  their  customers  come  to  them 
in  their  shops.  His  own  frontier  community  of  farmers  had  just 
reached  the  point  where  it  could  enjoy  the  luxury  of  having  their 
shoes  made  entirely  outside  the  household. 

Once  again  Hathaway  seems  to  represent  a  transition.  This 
time  it  was  from  purely  custom-made  work  in  his  community 
to  sale  work  sold  in  general  stores.  By  1807,  his  custom-made 
shoemaking  establishment  kept  three  journeymen  and  two  ap- 
prentices 2  busy  in  the  fifteen-by-twenty  foot  shop  in  his  dooryard, 
but  just  then  Hathaway  gave  it  up  on  the  excuse  that  sitting 
on  the  bench  hurt  his  stomach.  It  is  a  matter  of  suspicion  that  he 
realized  either  that  he  was  a  better  farmer  than  shoemaker,  or 
that  he  could  not  compete  with  the  sale  shoes  which  were  being 
put  on  the  market  and  make  as  good  a  living.  Immediately  upon 

*  Cf.  Appendix  XXVIII  for  the  story  of  this  man,  Samuel  Drew. 

*  These  men  made  the  pegs  they  used  and  the  women  of  his  family  spun  the  flax 
thread  and  made  their  own  wax  to  stiffen  the  thread. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  I35 

his  return  to  working  his  farm  with  undivided  time  and  strength, 
he  was  known  as  one  of  the  most  progressive  farmers  in  that 
region,  and  had  raised  124^  bushels  of  shelled  corn  on  one  acre, 
winning  a  prize  that  was  put  on  record. 

Josiah  Field,  the  Randolph  Bagman 

Josiah  Field,  on  the  other  hand,  had  been  one  of  seven  regular 
apprentices  in  a  Boston  shop.  In  the  War  of  181 2  he  was  drafted, 
but  his  twin  brother  went  in  his  place.  Josiah  came  to  Randolph 
and  worked  on  shoes  for  "a  Mr.  Faxon,  who  had  a  Boston  store." 
Josiah  Field  used  to  walk  into  Boston  with  the  boots  in  his  wallet, 
made  like  saddle  bags  and  carried  over  his  shoulder.  His  son, 
John  Field,  has  described  the  way  his  father  used  to  look  as  he 
started  off  on  the  fourteen-mile  walk  through  the  Blue  Hills.  He 
was  just  one  of  the  many  bagmen  ^  in  the  state,  but  one  of  the 
best  known  in  his  community. 

Samuel  White,  the  Expert  Pegger 

Samuel  White,  of  Randolph,  born  into  a  shoe  town  in  183 1,  had 
a  better  training  than  Paul  Hathaway,  though  not  a  formal  ap- 
prenticeship like  Josiah  Field.  He  did  not  abandon  his  trade  for 
farming,  for  he  became  an  expert  pegger  and  a  champion  seamer. 
He  has  told  me  of  his  work  as  a  little  boy  in  his  father's  shop, 
where  he  had  his  stint  to  do  even  before  he  was  old  enough  to  be 
taught  the  trade  definitely.-  His  father  was  the  farm  manager  for 

1  Cf.  Appendix  XXIX  for  story  of  an  English  bagman. 

^  Samuel  White  was  a  type,  one  of  the  hundreds  of  Massachusetts  boys,  who 
learned  the  shoemaking  trade  right  in  his  father's  shop  without  a  regular  indenture 
of  apprenticeship.  No  laws  in  the  state  obliged  a  shoemaker  then  to  show  creden- 
tials. One  realizes  the  freedom  possible  then  in  contrast  with  the  Old  England, 
where  the  propaganda  of  the  organized  shoe  workers  and  legislation,  aimed  to  keep 
out  of  the  trade  undertrained  or  self-taught  shoemakers,  made  such  credentials 
necessar>'  if  a  youth  was  to  become  a  journeyman  shoemaker.  Many  other  shoe- 
makers in  their  old  age  —  all  over  seventy  years,  some  over  eighty  years,  and  three 
over  ninety  years  —  have  told  me  of  their  share  as  children  in  the  family's  shoe- 
making.  Mr.  Loren  Puffer,  of  North  Bridgewater,  used  to  get  brogans  for  his 
mother  to  fit.  She  was  a  widow  and  so  later  he  went  to  live  with  Ebenczer  Tisdale  a 
farmer  who  made  shoes  during  winter  months  in  a  bedroom  in  the  second  story  of 
his  house.  The  shoes  he  taught  Puffer  to  work  upon  he  "took  out"  from  shops  in 
Randolph  and  the  boy  was  taught  to  last  and  peg,  never  to  cut  and  fit. 


136     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Dr.  Ebenezer  Alden  and  away  from  home  most  of  the  time,  so 
that  Sam's  brother  Solomon,  eighteen  years  older  than  he,  taught 
him  the  shoemaking  trade.  There  were  several  children  to  be  fed 
and  "Uncle  Sam"  ^  has  told  of  how  he  used  to  cry  himself  to 
sleep  in  his  trundle  bed  in  the  dark  attic,  hungry  enough  to  gnaw 
the  wooden  bed  post,  because  he  had  left  his  share  of  supper  to 
the  younger  boys  during  hard  times  in  1837.  Sam's  older  sister 
taught  him  to  sew  on  uppers,  and  was  such  a  good  teacher  and 
stern  mistress  that  he  could  seam  up  faster  than  any  man  in 
Randolph  or  the  vicinity.  Often  speed  contests  were  held  in  his 
Union  Street  shop.  Sam  could  "make  a  thread"  and  seam  up  a 
boot  in  15  minutes.  His  record  in  pegging  was  12  pair  (a  case)  in 
one  day  of  boots  with  double  soles  requiring  6/8  pegs.  He  worked 
with  both  hands  and  that  made  him  quicker  than  the  others. 

Isaac  Prouty,  the  Rich  ^^ Cobbler-Farmer '^ 

Isaac  Prouty,  of  Spencer,  Massachusetts,  was  another  shoe- 
maker brought  up  on  a  farm  with  double  duties  as  a  youth,  which 
he  still  combined  in  middle  life.  Traditions  linger  among  shoe- 
makers about  his  appearance  and  its  results.  He  was  once  found, 
by  a  buyer  from  the  West,  out  in  the  field  dressed  in  a  faded  coat 
which  was  without  buttons  and  tied  with  a  rope.  When  the  buyer 
hesitated  to  give  his  order  for  1000  cases  of  shoes,  Mr.  Prouty  led 
him  from  the  potato  field  to  the  barn,  which  he  was  using  partly 
as  a  storehouse.  There  he  told  the  buyer  to  rip  open  any  case  and 
take  out  a  sample;  that  he  already  had  1000  cases  just  like  "  that 
one"  ready  to  deliver.  Dressed  in  similar  fashion,  these  men  love 
to  tell,  Mr.  Prouty  hurried  off  from  his  farm  to  New  York  City 
once  suddenly,  on  hearing  of  an  auction  sale  of  leather.  His 
steady  bidding  up  to  large  sums  attracted  the  attention  of  his 
fellow  buyers,  and  even  the  auctioneer  had  open  fun  at  his  ex- 
pense. When  all  the  competitors  fell  off  and  considerable  stock 
was  knocked  down  to  "our  poor  cobbler  friend  here,"  buyers  and 
sellers  alike  in  that  market  flocked  about  him,  glad  to  make  the 
personal  acquaintance  of  the  man  whose  name,  given  quietly 

'  Already  quoted  on  p.  94.    As  a  grand  army  veteran  in  his  blue  military  cape 
he  became  "Uncle  Sam"  to  the  children  of  Randolph. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 27 

to  the  scoffing  auctioneer,  was  so  well  known  to  the  business 
world. 

On  the  way  home,  his  face  was  not  known  to  a  new  conductor 
on  the  railroad,  who  ignored  Mr.  Prouty's  request  and  ran  past 
Spencer  to  Worcester.  There  the  conductor  found  the  railroad 
officials  too  incensed  and  frightened  to  explain  to  him  what  he 
later  realized,  when  a  special  train  was  sent  back  to  Spencer  with 
Mr.  Prouty  —  that  this  farmer  whose  clothes  smelt  of  leather 
was  one  of  the  heaviest  stockholders  in  the  railroad. 

Asa  Jones  of  Nantucket  and  the  Putting-out  System 

Asa  Jones,  who  was  born  in  Nantucket  in  1829,  never  became  a 
wealthy  manufacturer  like  Isaac  Prouty,  but  remained  a  shoe- 
maker, cobbler,  shoe-retailer  all  his  life,  either  from  lack  of  capital, 
enterprise,  or  opportunity.  He  is  interesting  as  the  pioneer 
domestic  worker  who  linked  up  the  Island  of  Nantucket  with  the 
mainland  shoe  manufacturers. 

As  a  youth,  he  was  sent  by  his  father,  a  custom  shoemaker  of 
Nantucket,  to  Weymouth,  to  learn  any  "  new  tricks  of  the  trade." 
On  his  return  in  1852,  after  two  and  a  half  years  of  experience  on 
sale  boots  and  shoes,  he  helped  his  father  with  custom  work  on 
high  grade  ladies'  and  children's  as  well  as  men's  shoes,  until 
William  Reed  of  Abington,  whose  brother  had  worked  with  Jones 
in  Weymouth,  made  a  visit  to  Nantucket  and  arranged  to  "put 
out  work"  to  Jones.  The  stock  —  four  or  five  cases  at  a  time  for 
bottoming  —  was  sent  by  train  from  Abington  to  Hyannis  and 
by  boat  to  the  Island.  For  this  work,  Asa  Jones  hired  a  single 
room  ^  in  a  building  on  the  main  street,  and  one  man  to  help  him. 
The  soling  was  done  leisurely  in  odd  times  during  the  winter,  for 
the  stock  could  not  be  returned  until  the  ice  broke  up,  making  it 
feasible  for  the  boats  to  go  to  the  mainland.  Other  domestic 
workers  -  in  Nantucket  began  to  work  on  brogans  for  Kingman 

'  One  wonders  if  this  was  done  so  as  not  to  confuse  the  father's  stock  or  prejudice 
the  customers  of  the  old  custom  shoemaker. 

^  In  the  summer  of  191 5,  and  again  in  191 6  and  191 7,  .^sa  Jones  talked  with  me 
in  his  little  cobbler  shop  back  of  his  son's  retail  shoe  store,  at  first  with  great  reluc- 
tance and  evident  aversion  to  curious  strangers,  until  hearing  familiar  terms,  like 
cabbage  box,  working  on  the  bench,  shoulder  stick,  and  straights,  made  him  treat 


138     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

and  Swift,  two  shoe  manufacturers  from  North  Bridgewater,  who 
started  a  central  shop  in  Nantucket  about  1862. 

Three  Generations  of  Leach  Shoemakers 

In  the  Leach  family,  three  generations  of  shoemakers  spanned 
three  periods  of  the  boot  and  shoe  industry.  Levi,  living  and 
working  under  the  Custom  Stage,  succeeded  by  his  son,  George 
Martin,  who  lived  through  Custom  and  Domestic  into  the  Fac- 
tory Stage,  had  a  grandson,  George  Myron  Leach,  who  learned 
in  the  Domestic  Stage  and  worked  in  factories  until  after  1889. 
Their  story  is  probably  so  typical  of  eastern  Massachusetts  that 
it  can  be  used  here  as  an  illustration  of  the  trend  of  the  times  and 
trade. 

Levi  Leach  (born  1775  in  Halifax,  Mass.)  was  a  farmer  in 
South  Bridgewater  who  taught  school  in  winter  and  made  shoes 
in  a  ten-footer,  which  he  built  in  his  "side  front  yard."  His 
work  was  custom  work.  Where  he  himself  learned  the  trade  is  not 
remembered,  but  knowing  conditions  in  the  Bridgewater  regions 
during  his  youth  and  early  manhood,  would  make  us  wonder  if  he 
had  been  an  itinerant  cobbler,  Hke  Paul  Hathaway,  who  settled 
down  in  his  own  shop  and  began  custom  work.^  This  Levi  Leach, 
besides  teaching  school  three  months  each  year,  taught  his  three 
sons,  George,  Levi,  and  Giles,  to  make  shoes.  When  the  eldest 
son,  George  Martin  (bom  1821)  was  twenty-one,  he  went  to  East 
Middleboro  and  repeated  his  father's  program  in  buying  a  farm 
and  farming  it,  building  a  ten-footer  in  his  orchard  near  the 
street,  and  teaching  the  village  school  three  months  a  year.  The 
work  in  his  shop,  however,  was  not  of  the  custom  sort.  He  was 
soon  buying  stock,  cutting  it  up,  both  sole  and  upper  leather, 
for  brogans  and  Oxfords,  and  sending  the  uppers  out  to  women 
in  the  neighborhood  to  bind  and  side  up.    After  this  work  was 

me  like  a  comrade.  He,  of  course,  had  no  conception  of  the  Domestic,  or  putting- 
out  system  which  he  had  helped  to  introduce  into  the  island,  nor  a  thought  of  his 
having  shared  in  the  transition  from  the  custom  to  the  domestic  system,  though  he 
had  a  retailer's  instinct  for  thinking  "factory  made  shoes  were  the  only  thing  for 
these  days,"  and  did  not  now  resent  the  factory  system. 

*  If  so,  his  life  experience  included  the  second  phase  of  the  Home  Period,  and 
he  with  his  descendants  spanned  all  four  periods. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 39 

brought  back  to  his  ten-footer,  which  now  had  become  a  cen- 
tral shop,  the  uppers  were  inspected  and  sent  out  to  be  bottomed 
in  various  ten-footers  in  the  near  neighborhood  or  by  people 
"down  Plymouth  way."  By  the  time  his  younger  son,  George 
Myron  (born  1845)  was  seven  years  old,  George  Martin  Leach  had 
outgrown  his  ten-footer,  and  had  been  taken  into  partnership  by 
Deacon  Eddy  ^  of  East  Middleboro,  who  already  had  a  success- 
ful grocery  business  and  the  post  office  on  the  lower  floor  of  his 
two-story  square  building.  Deacon  Eddy  put  into  the  venture 
$10,000  which  he  had  made  in  the  shovel  business,  and  Leach  put 
in  only  $200  in  cash,  but  brought  knowledge  and  experience  of  the 
manufacturing  of  shoes.  Their  business  was  largely  in  brogans  for 
the  Southern  trade,  mainly  for  New  Orleans.  The  second  story  of 
the  Eddy  building  was  used  for  their  central  shop.  Here  both 
sons,  George  Myron  and  Giles,  learned  the  trade,  pasting  linings 
in  brogans,  then  closing  seams.  The  stint  for  a  twelve-year  old 
for  a  Saturday  forenoon  was  to  side  up  ten  pair  of  brogans,  using 
barrel  staves  for  clamps.  By  the  time  George  was  old  enough  to 
understand  machinery,  his  father's  firm  had  invested  in  a  stitch- 
ing machine  for  uppers  and  George  Myron  and  his  brother  Giles 
had  full  charge  of  the  stitching  in  a  small  fourteen  by  fourteen  ell 
added  to  the  back  of  the  building. 

By  i860,  when  Deacon  Eddy  was  ready  to  retire  from  the  firm, 
the  Eddy  and  Leach  central  shop  was  becoming  a  factory  where 
most  of  the  bottoming  as  well  as  the  cutting  and  crowning  was 
being  done  under  supervision  in  the  shop.  Leach  kept  up  the  firm 
until  1874,  but  instead  of  competing  with  other  manufacturers  who 
were  buying  and  installing  expensive  machinery,  he  became  more 
and  more  a  jobber,  buying  up  and  selling  shoes  already  made. 
Meanwhile  both  sons,  George  Myron  and  Giles,  had  moved  to 
Raynham  and  were  working  in  shoe  factories  there  and  in  Brock- 
ton as  stitchers,  George  keeping  it  up  until  1889.- 

*  Cf.  p.  71  where  this  is  mentioned. 

*  It  was  natural  that  these  sons,  George  and  Giles,  of  the  third  generation  of 
shoemakers,  being  born  into  an  age  of  specialization,  made  stitching  their  sole  busi- 
ness, and  never  farmed  nor  taught  school,  though  each  owned  a  farm,  and  were 
proud  of  their  sister  Anne  who  did  teach.  Of  George  Myron's  four  sons  and  two 
daughters,  none  ever  worked  on  shoes  but  one  son,  and  both  daughters  and  one 


I40     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

Lucy  Brown,  a  Contented  Rapid  Stitcher 

Many  other  shoeworkers  have  similar  memories.    Mrs.  Rich- 
mond Brown,  bom  in  1840  at  Hanson/  has  told  me  of  going,  as  a 
girl,  to  the  central  shop  in  North  Bridgewater,  to  take  out  boots 
for  her  amit  to  cord,  wheeling  them  to  and  from  the  house  in  a 
baby  carriage.  By  1861  she  was  stitching  by  foot  power  on  a  wax 
thread  post  machine  so  many  moccasins  ^  at  seventy-five  cents  a 
pair  that  she  made  four  dollars  a  day  easily.   If  she  did  not  get  at 
least  eighty  dollars  in  her  monthly  pay  envelope,  she  said  she  was 
disgusted,  but  she  generally  did,  for  work  was  plenty  and  she  had 
all  she  could  do.    She  said  that  a  man  working  beside  her  gave  up 
his  job  because  he  could  not  make  more  than  three  dollars  and  a 
half  a  day  where  she  and  other  young  women  were  making  four 
dollars  at  the  same  job.     By  1863  the  machines,  Wheeler  and 
Wilcox,  were  run  by  steam  power  in  Reed  and  Clapp's  shop,^ 
where  she  worked  through  the  6o's.    Not  many  men  ever  worked 
in  the  fitting  rooms,  for  there  was  work  enough  for  them  in  the 
lasting  and  bottoming  rooms.    Mrs.  Brown's  work  never  tired  her 
out;  she  and  her  fellow- workers  never  had  any  grievances.    They 
were  not  members  of  any  protective  shoe  organization  and  felt  no 
need  of  any.    She  always  enjoyed  her  work,  and  as  she  told  of  it 
at  the  age  of  seventy-seven  her  eyes  shone  and  her  hands  de- 
scribed the  motions  unconsciously.  When  the  present  Common- 
wealth Factory  began  in  1883,  she  stitched  the  uppers  of  the  first 
sample  shoes  they  made,  and  continued  to  work  there  until  191 2. 
Both  she  and  her  husband  said  repeatedly,  in  discussing  the 
St.  Crispin  movement,  that  they  and  their  friends  and  most  of 
their  neighbors,  all  shoemakers,  in  either  the  cutting,  fitting  or 
bottoming  departments,  had  no  grievances,  no  problems,  and  did 
not  care  to  organize  as  laborers.   They  probably  represented  the 
more  skilled  and  highly  paid  workers  of  the  old  English  stock  of 

grandchild  have  become  teachers,  making  five  generations  of  school  teachers,  and  at 
least  three  of  shoemakers  in  the  same  family. 

^  Formerly  a  part  of  Pembroke,  Mass. 

*  These  moccasins  were  made  of  cloth,  trimmed  with  leather,  and  lined  with 
buffalo  skin  for  men,  and  with  lamb's  wool  for  women,  and  soled  with  good  leather. 

'  This  shop  was  an  old  meeting  house  fixed  up  into  a  four-story  factory. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  I4I 

Massachusetts.  Some  of  the  Irish  immigrants  of  the  late  40's  and 
early  50's  felt  as  they  did.  Some  journeymen  in  Massachusetts, 
however,  thought  they  had  grievances  in  the  late  6o's. 

Labor  vs.  Capital  Problems  before  the  St.  Crispin 
Organization 

It  has  always  been  hard  for  individual  journeymen  shoe- 
makers, without  experience  in  the  manufacturer's  problems,  to 
realize  that  the  factory  organization  brought  into  the  industry 
entirely  new  problems,  such  as  having  large  amounts  of  fixed 
capital  involved  in  stock,  in  machinery  and  factory  buildings, 
where,  in  earlier  periods,  the  circulating  capital  with  which  to  pay 
wages  was  far  larger  proportionately  than  that  invested  in  central 
shops  or  stock.  Overhead  charges  were  slight  in  a  ten-footer  or  a 
50  X  100  Central  Shop,  even  when  credits  were  necessarily  long, 
as  in  the  Western  and  Southern  trade.  Entrepreneurs  came  more 
and  more  from  outside  the  trade.  There  is  ah  interesting  excep- 
tion, however,  as  late  as  1881,  which  is  typical  of  earlier  decades. 
M.  A.  Packard,  of  the  Abingtons,  was  docked  in  the  cutting  room, 
as  the  story  runs.  He  would  not  "stand  for  it"  and,  buying  up  a 
stock  of  leather,  cut  out  and  had  made  up  a  case  of  boots,  took 
them  to  Boston  and  sold  them  promptly  at  a  jobbing  house. 
With  the  larger  capital,  he  made  his  business  wider  and  wider, 
until  his  firm,  the  M.  A  Packard,  was  one  of  the  largest  in  Brock- 
ton. His  spirit  and  the  adventure  had  been  common  in  the  20's 
and  30's. 

In  early  days,  the  advance  in  wages  could  be  passed  on  to  the 
consumer;  but  in  case  of  production  for  widening  markets  and 
solicited  orders  which  involved  bargaining  and  planning  ahead 
for  wages,  the  manufacturers  could  not  change  wages  at  will 
without  doing  it  at  personal  loss.  It  was  but  natural  that  the 
workmen  should  always  see  the  increase  of  business,  in  size  an  ' 
number  of  grades,  without  appreciating  the  attendant  increasing 
risks,  losses,  and  problems.  Neither  did  they  take  into  account 
that  they,  by  their  demand  for  a  still  larger  share  of  the  profits 
as  increased  wages,  might  force  the  manufacturer  to  decide  to 
give  up  the  business  altogether  and  invest  his  capital  elsewhere. 


142     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

These  were  some  of  the  problems  and  possibiKties  in  the  shoe  in- 
dustry that  the  St.  Crispin  organization  did  not  realize  suflSciently 
from  1868  to  1874. 

Shoemakers  in  Massachusetts  in  Shoe  Organizations 

After  the  initial  ''Company  of  Shoemakers,"  the  so-called  Bos- 
ton Gild,  which  was  incorporated  in  1648  under  a  charter  granted 
by  the  Colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  no  attempt  at  organization 
of  shoemakers  as  such  was  ever  made  or  succeeded  ^  in  Massa- 
chusetts until  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin,  organized  there,  as  in  all 
other  shoemaking  parts  of  the  Union,  in  1868. 

In  the  first  case,  that  of  the  Boston  Gild,  the  shoemakers  ap- 
peared before  the  public  with  the  vicarious  object  of  preventing 
the  making  of  "bad  ware"  by  inferior  workmen.  It  must  have 
been  realized  even  then  that  the  move  was  not  wholly  unselfish, 
that  the  "bad  ware"  must  afifect  the  good  shoemakers  indirectly .^ 
No  definite  prices  of  goods  to  the  consumer,  nor  scale  of  wages  of 
journeymen  shoemakers  were  determined.  It  was  not  an  attempt 
at  a  closed  shop,  but  at  gathering  into  the  shop  the  parts  of  the 
work  formerly  done  by  the  family  aided  by  the  more  skilled  itiner- 
ant cobbler.  While  it  advertised  to  protect  the  public  from  poor 
work  by  taking  the  itinerant  cobbler  into  the  master's  shop  where 
his  work  could  be  watched  by  the  gild  officers,  it  subtly  opened  the 
way  for  masters  of  the  trade  to  make  more  of  the  shoes  of  the 
community  in  these  same  custom  shops.  We  have  seen  the  pass- 
ing in  the  city  though  not  yet  in  the  country  of  the  "  itinerant " 

*  As  yet  I  have  found  no  trace  in  the  Massachusetts  shoe  industry  of  the  exist- 
ence of  the  Society  of  Master  Cordwainers  which  was  in  Philadelphia  in  1789;  of 
the  Federal  Society  of  Journeymen  Cordwainers,  which  was  in  Philadelphia,  1794- 
1806,  or  of  the  United  Beneficial  Society  of  Journeymen  Cordwainers  organized  in 
Philadelphia  in  1835,  mentioned  and  described  in  the  Quarterly  Journal  of  Eco- 
nomics, November,  1909,  by  Mr.  John  R.  Commons,  in  an  article  on  the  American 
Shoemakers. 

"There  was  a  shoemakers  association  in  Lynn  as  early  as  1651."  Article  in  City 
of  Lynn  Semi-Centennial,  Lynn  Fifty  Years  a  City,  p.  66.  Printed  by  direction  of 
Celebration  Committee,  Lynn,  1900. 

1  have  never  found  this  statement  elsewhere.  I  do  not  know  whether  it  is  correct 
or  not. 

2  Cf.  Appendix  VI  for  their  charter  and  the  general  history  of  the  movement. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 43 

dressmaker  of  our  own  days  and  of  the  unprofessional  or  under- 
trained  nurse  who  could  not  be  accepted  in  an  association  of 
skilled  women  of  her  profession. 

When  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin  organized  two  centuries  later, 
they  still  feared  the  inferior  workman,  but  not  his  work.  They 
were  determined  to  oust  from  their  trade  "green  hands"  whose 
work  on  machines  made  as  good  if  not  better  shoes  than  the  ordi- 
nary journeyman  shoemaker  could  turn  out  by  hand  processes  and 
tools.'  This  state  of  affairs  had  not  been  reached  until  the  late 
6o's,  when  the  McKay  machine  was  well  established  and  tested, 
so  that  even  a  Chinaman  who  understood  not  a  word  of  the 
English  used  by  the  foreman  in  the  factory,  who  knew  nothing  of 
the  processes  of  shoemaking,  could  turn  out  a  satisfactory  piece  of 
work  by  using  his  eyes  and  imitating  motions  which  he  might  or 
might  not  understand.  When  the  threat  of  using  Chinese  labor 
with  none  of  the  boasted  Yankee  ingenuity  was  made  by  manu- 
facturers and  carried  out  by  Sampson,  of  North  Adams,  it  was  an 
overwhelming  surprise,  a  crushing  answer  to  the  arguments  of 
Massachusetts  boot  and  shoe  workers  that  shoemakers  had  to  be 
men  of  skill  and  highly  inteUigent.  They  had  not,  as  they  pro- 
tested then,  and  do  to  this  day,  objected  to  machinery  itself.  As 
machine  after  machine  was  introduced  between  1835  and  1865  to 
do  work  on  stock  or  to  aid  processes  on  uppers  or  soles,  the 
journeyman  shoemakers  had  not  protested  for  they  expected  to 
have  chances  to  work  at  these  machines.  While  apprentices  who 
developed  into  full-fledged  allround  shoemakers  became  fewer 
and  fewer  as  young  people  of  a  shoe  town  went  into  central  shops 
and  factories  to  learn  just  one  process,  and  the  members  of  the 
gang  of  bootmakers  were  expert  at  only  one  part  of  a  process,  the 
journeyman  shoemakers  of  Massachusetts  were  content.  They 
were  busy;    they  were  earning  good  wages  steadily  during  the 

'  Commons  says  (In  American  Shoemakers,  Quarterly  Journal  of  Economics  for 
Nov.,  1909,  p.  75)  that  the  "factory  succeeded  in  producing  a  quality  of  work  equal 
or  even  superior  to  that  produced  by  the  journeyman."  This  needs  qualification  to  be 
accepted  by  real  shoemakers  of  the  past  or  present.  The  McKay  sewed  shoe  even 
in  1868  could  not  be  called  a  superior  product  to  the  shoe  made  by  a  custom  shoe- 
maker of  skill  and  full  training.  Even  today,  with  the  perfected  Goo<lyear  welling 
machines  and  various  machines  for  turned  shoes  of  high  grade,  there  arc  whole 
factories  devoted  to  making  by  hand  shoes  which  sell  for  fancy  prices. 


144     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

"runs"  of  each  year.  They  did  not  have  the  grievances  felt  so 
bitterly  in  the  Philadelphia  centre  of  having  to  compete  with 
prison  labor  and  sweatshop  workers.^  In  fact  they  were  them- 
selves considered  a  grievance  to  the  better  class  shoemakers  of 
Philadelphia.  Yet  each  period  of  rapid  expansion  in  the  shoe 
industry,  especially  the  one  following  the  War  of  1812,  the  ones 
that  culminated  in  or  were  checked  by  the  panics  of  1837  and 
1857  in  turn,  had  brought  into  the  trade  the  marginal  producer, 
the  under-trained  or  the  unskillful  shoeworker.  This  had  been, 
however,  for  confessedly  poorer  work,  to  sell  at  a  lower  price,  such 
as  sale  work,  market  work  on  speculation,  or  work  for  Spanish 
consumption  in  South  America,  Mexico  or  Cuba.  Whenever 
manufacturers  were  competing  against  each  other  for  labor,  poor 
workmen  had  stepped  into  the  trade  at  relatively  good  pay.  But 
at  the  time  of  a  panic  or  a  slump  in  business  these  had  been  the 
first  to  go.  Each  time  the  recuperation  of  the  shoe  industry  was 
characterized  by  more  precise  workmanship,  more  styles,  and 
more  standardization.  The  poorer  workmen  ^  were  the  first  to 
be  dismissed  under  such  a  regime  of  readjustment.  Such  in- 
ferior workmen  could,  however,  temporarily  reduce  wages  and 
were  always  somewhat  feared  as  well  as  disdained  by  real  shoe- 
makers. 
!.  In  1867,  however,  the  green  hand,  the  untrained  shoeworker, 
^'  might  be  a  mere  machine  operator  and  beside  turning  out  good 
work,  could  usurp  the  journeyman's  place  or  else  reduce  his  wages. 
Manufacturers,  with  hosts  of  unskilled  laborers  to  call  upon,  . 
need  not  compete  with  each  other  and  send  up  wages.    On  the   ^ 


other  hand,  those  manufacturers  who  did  not  have  machines 

1  In  1835  Philadelphia  shoemakers  publicly  complained  that  the  Eastern  States, 
meaning  Massachusetts,  did  not  do  shoemaking  as  well  as  they,  and  charged  less. 
This  was  probably  true  in  all  its  order  and  sale  work  aside  from  its  regular  private 
custom  work.  New  England  was  specializing  then  in  brogans  and  cheap  shoes  for 
women.  The  Philadelphia  shoe  industry  always  made  the  highest  grade  shoes  with 
skilled  German  workers.  Boots  were  never  made  save  as  custom  work.  Those 
workers  probably  felt  about  Massachusetts  shoemakers  then  as  our  Lynn  and 
Brockton  Union  shoemakers  feel  about  the  non-union  workers  in  Maine  today. 

2  Samuel  Cox,  of  Lynn,  has  told  me  of  his  difficulty  in  getting  work  in  1838.  He 
was  not  a  shoemaker,  but  a  workman  who  had  learned  in  less  than  a  year  to  do  work 
on  cheap  children's  shoes  and  had  found  plenty  to  do  before  1837. 


I 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 45 

turning  out  eighty  pair  where  a  journeyman  worker  could  do  one 
pair,  had  to  reduce  wages  to  survive  at  all.  Shoe  shops,  the  shoe- 
makers felt,  must  be  closed  against  such  green  hands,  and  manu- 
facturers who  would  not  agree  to  it,  must  find  empty  workrooms. 
Organizing  leaders  said  all  the  shoemakers  must  stand  by  each 
other  in  this  movement.  Massachusetts  shoeworkers,  to  a  large 
number,!  joined  the  country-wide  organization  of  Knights  of  St. 
Crispin,  helping  to  swell  its  total  membership  to  forty  or  fifty 
thousand. 

Origin  and  Sources  of  Information  concerning  the 
Knights  of  St.  Crispin 

A  Massachusetts  man  born  and  bred,  formerly  a  bootmaker  in 
Milford,  then  at  work  in  Wisconsin,  Newell  Daniels  by  name,  was 
the  leading  spirit  of  the  union  when  it  was  organized  in  Mil- 
waukee in  the  spring  of  1867. 

The  name  of  the  organization  had  much  to  help  it  in  its  cen- 
turies-old usage  among  cordwainers  or  shoemakers.  The  wealth 
of  St.  Crispin  legends  ^  and  songs  could  easily  be  revived.  The 
history  of  the  original  sixteenth-century  Order  of  St.  Crispin 
could  be  effectively  rehearsed  in  meetings  of  their  nineteenth  cen- 
tury brother  shoemakers.  Their  meetings  and  rites,  their  initia- 
tion vows  and  pledges  were  secret,  but  their  demands  as  laid 
before  the  manufacturers  and  their  objects  as  stated  to  fellow 
shoemakers  whom  they  sought  to  persuade  or  force  into  member- 
ship were  public  property  then  as  now.  Within  the  last  ten  years 
research  students  ^  have  found  and  collected  important  original 
material  on  the  subject,  such  as  the  proceedings  of  the  Grand 
Lodge,  speeches  of  Grand  Knights,  reports  of  officers,  besides  the 
text  of  the  Constitution  of  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin.  From  such 
sources,  added  to  popular  stories  of  old  shoemakers,  a  fairly  life- 

'  Investigation  does  not  prove,  however,  that  even  a  majority  joined  the 
Crispins. 

-  See  Appendix  XXX-XXXIV  for  some  of  the  Crispiniana  that  had  accumu- 
lated in  literature  before  1868. 

'  See  Lescohier's  use  of  such  materials  in  "The  Knights  of  St.  Crispin  1867- 
1874."  Published  in  the  Economic  and  Political  Science  Series  of  the  Bulletins  of 
the  University  of  Wisconsin. 


146     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

like  picture  of  the  workings  of  the  St.  Crispin  order  can  be  drawn 
today. 

Objects  of  the  St.  Crispin  Organization 

The  object  of  the  organization  ^  was:  (i)  to  keep  out  of  the 
shoe  trade  all  new  workers,  "green  hands,"  except  sons  of  St. 
Crispin  members  who  might  be  taught  the  trade;  (2)  to  keep  the 
prices  of  work  on  boots  and  shoes  up  to  that  demanded  by  the 
skilled  workers;  (3)  to  refuse  to  work  in  any  shop  or  for  any  em- 
ployer who  employed  scab  labor  or  who  would  not  keep  a  ''closed 
shop,"  in  modern  parlance.  The  opposition  of  the  Order  of  St. 
Crispin,  as  stated  by  the  members  both  then  and  now,  was  al- 
ways to  the  "abuse"  of  machinery,  i.e.,  its  operation  by  non- 
y  shoemakers,  and  not  to  machinery  itself.  This  seems  a  mere 
quibble  to  us  in  one  way,  for  we  are  so  accustomed  to  the  idea  of 
installing  "fool-proof  machinery"  that  will  save  the  employment 
j  of  skilled  labor.  But  if  we  realize  that  the  investment  of  capital 
on  a  large  scale  in  machinery  was  not  familiar  to  them  in  its  in- 
tent and  results,  they  seem  sincere  enough.^  The  object  was  also 
(4)  to  encourage  cooperative  manufacture  which  would  assure 

5    not  only  fair  wages  and  more  regular  work  but  self-employment. 

I  This  was  announced  in  the  Preamble  of  the  Constitution:  "We 
believe  also  in  cooperation  as  a  proper  and  efficient  remedy  for 

I  many  of  the  evils  of  the  present  iniquitous  system  of  wages  that 
concedes  to  the  laborer  only  so  much  of  his  own  productions  as 

V  shall  make  comfortable  living  a  bare  possibility,   and  places 

^  See  Appendix  XXXVI  for  text  of  Article  X  which  states  the  object  as  far  as 
"new  help"  is  concerned.  Mr.  John  F.  Tobin,  General  President  of  the  Boot  and 
Shoe  Workers  Union,  wrote  in  191 5  as  follows:  "I  have  never  found  anyone  who 
could  give  me  any  connected  history  of  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin,  notwithstanding 
the  fact  that  I  have  made  diligent  search.  I  was  a  member  of  the  organization  some 
forty-three  years  ago,  but  at  that  time,  did  not  accumulate  any  knowledge  of  its 
workings. 

"I  feel  that  its  history  was  not  of  any  great  consequence  and  its  achievements 
did  not  go  beyond  seeking  higher  wages  through  the  old-fashioned  strike  method. 
At  that  time,  employers  were  practically  unanimous  in  opposition  to  organization 
of  the  workers,  and  the  contests  generally  hinged  upon  a  recognition  of  the  Union 
in  conjunction  with  the  wage  question." 

2  "We  liked  the  machines,  but  we  wanted  to  have  a  chance  to  run  them.  We'd 
been  bom  and  bred  as  shoemakers,"  is  the  testimony  today  of  old  workers  who  be- 
longed to  the  Order. 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 47 

education  and  social  position  beyond  his  reach."  '  This  belief  in 
cooperative  production  was  the  only  constructive  propaganda 
that  the  order  evolved.  The  main  vigor  of  their  order  was  spent 
in  protective  measures  as  to  wages  and  "green  hands." 

Membership 

Out  of  a  total  membership  of  50,000  -  claimed  in  1870,  we  do  not 
know  how  many  were  Massachusetts  men,  though  the  American 
Workman  of  March  5,  1870  claimed  that  there  were  40,000 
Crispins  in  that  state.  There  were,  however,  three  local  lodges 
formed  in  Massachusetts  in  September  of  1867;  forty-three 
formed  iluring  1868;  sixty-seven  were  recorded  as  being  active  in 
the  state  in  1869,  and  eighty-tive  active  lodges  at  the  end  of  1870, 
when  the  order  as  a  whole  throughout  the  country  was  at  its 
height,  in  power  and  enrollment.  That  Massachusetts  shoukl 
back  up  Newell  Daniels,  the  founder,  was  natural.  That  Lynn 
and  Worcester  should  have  the  most  members  and  the  severest 
strikes  over  grievances  seems  natural  too,  since  they  were  the 
largest  shoe  centres.  Yet  Massachusetts  had  the  same  falling  ofif 
in  numbers,  suffered  from  the  same  delinquencies  of  members  and 
fellow  lodges,  and  was  open  to  the  charge  of  lukewarmness  just 
as  much  as  any  other  state  which  joined  the  National  Grand 
Lodge. 

Rites  and  Vows 

There  seems  to  have  been  no  really  effective  way  of  keeping 
members  true  to  their  initiation  vows;  no  good  system  of  collect- 
ing dues;  and  no  adequate  framework  of  rules  to  keep  a  good 
organization,  in  spite  of  the  high  aims  and  worthy  services  of 
certain  founders  and  leaders  of  the  Order  of  St.  Crispin.  Just 
what  the  initiation  rites  were  remained  a  profound  secret  during 
the  lifetime  of  the  order,  though  shrewd  guesses  and  waggish 
stories '  gave  a   popular  conception.     Fortunately  there  is  re- 

'  Cf.  p.  148  —  where  mention  is  made  of  the  dilTerence  which  came  in  the  atti- 
tude of  members  towards  the  more  prosperous  workmen  in  their  order  who  became 
foremen  and  then  employers. 

*  See  Lescohier:  Knights  of  St.  Crispin,  pp.  7-8,  for  discussion  of  enrollment. 

'  I  have  had  initiation  rites  described  to  me  by  a  shoemaker  who  did  not  join 


148     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

corded  the  vow  or  initiation  oath  supposed  to  be  taken  by  all 
members  which  gives  such  an  adequate  conception  of  the  promises 
and  behefs  of  individual  Crispins  that  it  is  reprinted  here  in  full. 

I  do  solemnly  and  sincerely  pledge  1  myself,  my  word  and  honor  as  a  man, 
before  God  and  these  witnesses  present,  that  I  wiU  not  divulge  any  of  the 
secrets  of  this  Lodge  to  any  one  who  I  do  not  know  to  be  a  member  in  good 
standing,  except  my  spiritual  adviser.  I  will  not  make  known  any  of  the 
signs  of  recognition  or  any  matter  pertaining  to  the  good  of  the  order.  I 
faithfully  pledge  myself,  that  I  will  not  learn,  or  cause  to  be  learned,  any  new 
hand,  any  part  of  the  boot  and  shoe  trade,  without  the  consent  of  this  lodge, 
and  I  will  do  all  I  can  to  prevent  others  from  doing  the  same.  I  shall  con- 
sider myself  bound,  if  any  member  shall  violate  this  rule,  to  be  his  enemy, 
and  will  work  against  his  interest  in  every  way  possible  without  violating  the 
civil  law.  I  further  pledge  myself  that  if  a  member  gets  discharged  from  a  job 
of  work,  because  he  refuses  to  learn  a  new  hand,  that  I  will  not  take  his  place, 
except  the  member  discharged  gives  his  consent.  I  also  agree  to  be  governed 
by  the  will  of  the  members  of  the  order.  This  pledge,  I  agree  to  keep  invio- 
late, whether  I  remain  a  member  or  not,  as  long  as  the  organization  stands. 
So  help  me  God. 

Before  a  shoemaker  could  take  this  vow  or  become  eligible  for 
membership  he  had  to  work  for  ''an  aggregate  of  two  years  at 
boot  and  shoemaking,"  bring  forward  evidence  satisfactory  to  the 
lodge  he  proposed  to  join,  and  be  engaged  at  his  task  at  the  time.^ 
I  If  a  shoemaker  became  an  agent  or  a  foreman  or  a  manufac- 
turer, even  on  the  smallest  scale,  he  could  no  longer  be  a  member 
of  the  Order.  Henceforth  his  interests  were  supposed  to  be  allied 
to  capital  and  hostile  to  labor. 

Dues  and  Duties 

By  the  terms  of  the  Constitution  of  the  Grand  Lodge  of  the 
Knights  of  St.  Crispin  and  by  those  of  local  lodges,  the  dues  were 
fixed  ^  at  thirty  cents  as  a  per  capita  tax  to  be  levied  yearly  on 

the  order.  Just  how  he  got  his  information  or  whether  it  was  a  popular  guess  I  can- 
not judge.  The  candidate  for  membership,  he  says,  was  swung  to  and  fro  in  a  blanket 
held,  jerked,  and  pulled  at  the  ends  by  two  members.  When  a  certain  old  man  by 
the  name  of  Shannahan,  of  Abington,  was  being  inducted,  tradition  says  the  ritual 

"Welkim,  welkim  to  this  band 
Here  goes  up  old  Shannahan." 

1  This  pledge  was  printed  in  the  "Hide  and  Leather  Interest,"  issue  of  May,  1869. 
Cf.  Lescohier,  p.  29  and  Appendix  XXXVL 

2  See  Const.  Article  XVI  on  membership.        ^  See  Const.  Article  IX  on  revenue. 


!V! 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 49 

each  member  of  subordinate  lodges.  One  half  of  the  amount  was 
to  be  collected  in  the  month  of  July ;  the  balance  in  the  month  of 
January  in  each  year.  These  were  the  dates  when  the  winter  and 
summer  runs  were  in  full  swing  so  that  the  money  could  be  easily 
spared  and  readily  given.  This  amount  was  to  cover  the  over- 
head expenses  of  the  organization.  Each  member  of  a  subordinate 
lodge  was  to  pay  into  the  local  treasury  fifty  cents  as  a  contingent 
fund  for  meeting  the  expenses  of  "grievances"  i.  e.,  strikes  and 
individual  non-employment  enforced  by  obedience  to  the  vows  of 
the  Order. 

Because  many  lodges  failed  to  exact  and  collect  this  contingent 
fund,  the  strikes  were  badly  and  tardily  financed.  Several  former 
Crispin  members  have  told  me  that  there  were  no  dues  in  their 
lodges.  This  statement  at  first  seemed  to  indicate  a  lapse  of 
memory  on  their  part,  but  after  reading  the  indictment  made  by 
various  officers  of  the  Grand  Lodge  against  local  orders,  one  is 
forced  to  believe  that  the  given  facts  represent  actual  conditions 
in  some  places.  Normally  each  Crispin  was  supposed  to  be  taxed 
thirty  cents  a  year  and  perhaps  eighty  cents  if  one  strike  occurred 
in  his  province. 

The  duties  of  the  lodge  members  consisted,  as  their  vows  indi- 
cate, in  resisting  invasion  of  their  rights  as  shoemakers.  They 
were  expected  (i)  to  refuse  to  teach  a  green  hand  even  if  they  lost 
their  jobs  by  so  doing;  (2)  to  take  a  share  in  the  meetings  and  in 
pushing  the  propaganda  of  their  order;  (3)  to  hold  whatever 
offices  in  the  lodge  they  were  chosen  to  fill;  (4)  to  refrain  from 
discussing  within  the  lodge  room  the  merits  or  demerits  of  any 
religious  denomination  or  political  party;  ^  (5)  to  refrain  from 
injuring  the  interests  of  a  brother  Crispin  by  undermining  him  in 
price  or  wages  or  by  any  underhand  act;  ^  (6)  to  use  their  utmost 
endeavor  to  induce  persons  who  work  for  them  or  with  them  in 
their  trade  to  join  the  Order.^ 

»  See  Const.  Article  XIX. 

2  See  Const.  Article  XVIII. 

'  See  Const.  Article  VI  of  the  subordinate  lodges. 


I50     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

External  and  Internal  Problems  of  the  Massachusetts 
Lodges  of  the  Order 

Perhaps  the  strikes  were  the  most  prominent  of  the  external 
problems  as  well  as  the  most  effective  weapons  of  Crispins.  The 
strike  of  1870,  lasting  for  three  months  among  the  shoemakers  of 
Worcester,  involving  1200  men  and  costing  $175,000,  made 
anxious  days  and  heavy  financial  obligations  for  Massachusetts 
Crispins.  The  Lynn  lodges  were  so  strong  and  successful  in  the 
first  strikes  of  1869  and  1870  that  the  manufacturers  "hardly 
dared  to  take  orders."  Some  firms  moved  out  of  the  state,  to  the 
eventual  loss  of  the  Crispins  who  had  thus  narrowed  the  market 
for  their  labor.  The  North  Adams  strike  of  1872  was  ended  for 
the  Crispins  by  the  unexpected  but  determined  action  of  Calvin 
T.  Sampson,  who  brought  107  Chinamen  from  California  for  his 
factory.^ 

The  greatest  internal  problem,  a  very  real  and  fatal  difficulty, 
was  that  of  financing  the  work  of  the  Crispin  Organization,  al- 
ready mentioned  ^  in  connection  with  dues.  Lescohier,  our  chief 
authority  on  the  history  of  the  Order,  says  "the  Crispins  failed 
even  from  the  first  to  finance  their  grievance  strikes  adequately; 
and  the  failure  was  fatal."  The  man  who  gave  up  his  job  for  the 
cause  could  draw  at  best  but  six  dollars  a  week  for  himself,  two 
dollars  for  a  wife  or  mother  dependent  upon  him,  and  one  dollar 
for  each  child  under  twelve  years  of  age.  This  aid  barely  kept 
them  from  want  in  winter  and  when  the  local  lodges  neglected 
entirely,  or  in  part  —  through  indifference,  lack  of  sympathy  or 
of  efficient  officials  —  to  collect  and  pay  over  moneys  due  the 
strikers  or  grievance  bearers,  the  Crispin  order  suffered  in  the 
eyes  of  the  public  and  the  unprotected  members  were  ready  to 
leave  the  lodge. 

The  great  distress  felt  by  the  leaders  of  the  Grand  Lodge  over 
this  financial  situation  was  voiced  in  Boston  at  the  third  Annual 

'  Mr.  Jerome  Fletcher,  quoted  in  the  opening  pages  of  this  book,  often  told  me 
with  glee,  from  the  manufacturers'  and  the  non-Crispin  point  of  view,  how  the 
Crispins  "reckoned  without  their  host"  at  that  North  Adams  factory. 

*  Cf.  pp.  148-149. 


TEE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  I  5 1 

meeting  of  the  Grand  Lodge  on  April  19,  1870,  by  the  Chief 
Knight  of  the  whole  order: 

You  perhaps  think  it  strange  that  I  dwell  so  much  upon  the  duties  of 
deputies,  but  after  I  explain,  you  will  see  the  necessity.  At  our  last  annual 
session  we  had  some  evils  to  overcome  which  were  great  obstacles  to  the 
well-doing  and  carrying  on  of  the  institution.  The  greatest  of  these  was  that 
some  of  the  lodges  were  perfectly  indifferent  with  regard  to  the  payment  of 
the  International  and  Grievance  taxes.  While  the  Chicago  grievance  was 
going  on,  there  were  certain  persons  who  discouraged  the  lodges  from  sending 
in  their  taxes.  It  is  very  easy  to  discourage  individuals  from  paying  out 
money,  so  easy  that  one  man  wishing  to  get  the  good  will  of  the  majority, 
can  baffle  a  dozen  of  good  men  from  sending  any  money  to  the  International 
or  suffering  lodges.  I  want  the  deputies  to  know  their  duties,  and  do  them. 
I  want  them  and  the  lodges  to  understand  that  they  have  their  authority, 
from  the  International  Lodge,  and  that  the  lodges  must  obey  and  respect 
them,  particularly  when  they  remind  them  that  they  are  doing  those  things 
which  ought  not  to  be  done,  and  leaving  undone  those  things  which  ought  to 
be  done.  .  .  . 

I  sincerely  believe  that  if  the  deputies  had  understood  their  duty,  and  the 
lodges  had  known  their  power,  all  the  lodges  who  have  had  recognized 
grievances  would  have  received  the  money  due  them  at  the  proper  time, 
which  has  not  been  the  case.  Many  persons  have  said  to  me,  "Are  you  not 
discouraged  ?  "  My  answer  invariably  has  been,  "No,  sir."  "Well,"  they 
would  say,  "I  am.  I  think  the  Order  never  saw  such  trying  times.  W^e  are 
terribly  in  debt ,  and  no  money  to  pay  it.  The  plan  of  keeping  the  money  in  the 
lodges  is  a  failure."  And  they  would  go  on  to  tell  how  the  members  of  the 
International  Lodge  did  very  wrong  in  adopting  such  a  plan  —  that  they 
might  have  known  better,  etc.  Let  me  say,  brothers,  it  is  very  easy  for  us  to 
say  that  anything  is  wrong  after  it  has  been  proved  to  be  so.  It  is  very  easy 
for  us  to  say  that  a  certain  measure  is  wrong  after  we  have  tried  it  for  one 
year,  and  it  has  proved  to  be  a  failure.  But  let  me  say  that  this  idea  of  having 
a  contingent  fund  in  the  subordinate  lodges,  is  a  good  one.  I  believe  that 
there  can  be  no  better  plan  for  the  safe  keeping  of  the  money,  and  that  it  can 
be  sent  to  any  point  where  a  grievance  may  arise  as  soon  as  from  two  to  ten 
days  after  the  grievance  has  been  recognized.  The  machine  is  right,  but  the 
operators  are  wrong.  Let  me  just  cite  to  you  briefly  the  manner  in  which 
this  department  has  been  managed.  When  the  C.  S.,  of  a  lodge  receives 
notice  of  the  recognition  of  a  grievance,  and  that  his  lodge  is  called  upon  to 
send  a  certain  per  cent  of  their  contingent  fund  in  support  of  it,  he  puts  the 
communication  into  his  pocket,  and  forgets  all  about  it,  till  after  the  meeting, 
and  if  the  lodge  meets  but  once  a  fortnight,  it  will  be  in  his  possession  about 
three  weeks  before  the  lodge  knows  anything  about  it.  He  then  brings  it  into 
the  lodge  and  reads  it ;  it  may  be  acted  upon,  and  it  may  not;  if  it  is,  you  will 
find  perhaps  a  member  who  goes  against  everything  that  is  brought  up,  un- 
less it  may  be  something  for  his  benefit.  .  .  . 

Last  International  session  we  found  ourselves  in  debt  about  ($20,000) 
twenty  thousand  dollars.    The  Executive  Council  cleared  up  all  the  ap- 


152     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

parent  mysteries  of  the  Chicago  grievance,  so  that  all  the  delegates  were  per- 
fectly satisfied.  They  all  promised  to  go  home  to  their  lodges,  and  if  they 
were  in  arrears  to  induce  them  to  send  the  money  right  along  to  pay  Chicago ; 
but  the  money  did  not  come.  Why  not  ?  I  answer,  because  the  rank  and  file 
did  not  understand  it.  The  delegates  did  not  take  pains  to  push  the  matter. 
At  the  meeting  of  the  Executive  Council,  held  in  October,  the  Council  took 
into  consideration  the  question  of  delinquent  lodges,  and  came  to  the  con- 
clusion that  it  would  not  be  just  for  them  to  levy  a  tax  upon  the  lodges  that 
were  not  in  existence  at  the  time  of  the  Chicago  grievance,  neither  did  they 
think  that  it  would  be  just  to  ask  the  lodges  who  had  paid  their  dollar  and 
twenty-five  cent  tax,  to  pay  it  over  again.  And  neither  did  they  expect  that 
they  would  pay  any  assessments  for  those  grievances  until  the  delinquent 
lodges  were  obliged  to  pay.  We  knew  that  we  had  no  power  to  force  these 
lodges  to  pay  their  taxes.  So,  there  was  nothing  left  for  us  to  do  but  to  ask 
each  member  who  had  a  heart  in  this  institution  to  contribute  voluntarily 
one  dollar  or  upwards,  for  the  purpose  of  paying  our  debts;  debts  that  were 
contracted  in  fighting  our  battles.  But  there  has  been  very  Httle  money 
received  on  that  call.  .  .  . 

Now,  I  firmly  believe  if  the  officers  of  the  lodges  had  made  an  effort  to 
collect  the  money  on  that  call,  we  would  not  be  in  debt  one  cent  today. 

Like  the  Confederation  of  the  United  States  in  1776  to  1789 
where  Congress  and  the  Executive  Committee  of  Nine  could  not 
force  the  constituent  elements  of  the  organization,  the  states,  to 
pay  the  money  requisitioned  as  their  quota,  so  the  Grand  Lodge 
of  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin  could  not  force  the  local  lodges  to 
pay  their  just  share.  There  was  more  hard  feeling  and  actual 
cause  for  anxiety  on  this  score  than  on  any  other  until  the  end  of 
the  Order  was  admitted  to  have  come  in  1874.  Long  before  that 
another  cause  for  disquiet  was  felt  by  leaders  and  by  thinkers  in 
the  organization  over  the  divergent  views  as  to  members  who 
became  prosperous.  By  the  Constitution  already  quoted  ^  mem- 
bership ceased  automatically  for  a  shoemaker  who  became  a 
foreman  or  manufacturer,  except  he  was  employed  under  a  co- 
operative system.  Even  here  he  was  viewed  with  suspicion  by 
many  who  had  avowed  themselves  in  sympathy  with  coopera- 
tive boot  and  shoe  production.  When  Mr.  Newell  Daniels  as 
International  Grand  Scribe  was  reporting  to  the  National  Body 
at  its  meeting  in  1870,  he  attacked  this  question  boldly .^    As  the 

1  Cf.  Const.  Article  XVI. 

2  "  I  wish  to  call  the  attention  of  this  body  to  Article  IX,  Sec.  3,  in  regard  to  eligi- 
bility of  membership,  in  relation  to  foremen  and  manufacturers.  I  think  this  section 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  1 53 

founder  of  the  order  his  views  would  have  seemed  to  be  entitled 
to  weight. 

There  is  no  evidence  that  his  warning  criticism  of  a  narrow  pol- 
icy was  heeded.  The  Grand  Lodge  and  its  oflEicers  from  first  to  last 
seldom  influenced  the  rank  and  file  of  the  Order  of  St.  Crispin 
after  the  initial  constitution  was  once  made  and  accepted.  The 
Order's  lack  of  flexibility  in  views,  and  lack  of  stabihty  in  action, 
were  its  own  undoing. 

Effects  of  St.  Crispin  Organization  upon  the  Boot  and 

Shoe  Industry 

Temporary  success  was  all  that  the  Crispins  ever  gained  in 
Massachusetts.  Burrell  and  Maguire,  of  Randolph,  acceded  to 
the  first  demands  of  the  St.  Crispins,  and  then  closed  its  shop.^ 
One  Abington  firm,  Washington  Reed's,  went  out  of  business 
rather  than  submit,  it  is  said;  but  it  sold  out  to  another  firm  who 
accepted  none  of  the  demands  and  did  a  flourishing  business. 
Various  shoe  men  have  told  me  that  neither  manufacturers  nor 
non-members  of  the  order  took  the  organization,  or  its  demands, 
very  seriously.  Another,  an  active  officer  of  the  Randolph  order, 
told  me  in  lively  disgust,  forty-five  years  after  the  Order  closed  its 

should  be  materially  changed,  modified,  or  more  clearly  defined.  In  several  places  in 
the  Western  States  where  the  manufacturing  is  confined  to  custom  work,  lodges  have 
got  into  some  trouble  with  the  manufacturer,  and  their  best  and  leading  men  have 
been  obliged  to  leave  town  or  open  a  shop  of  their  own.  The  cases  are  quite  numer- 
ous where  members  have  opened  a  little  shop  of  their  own,  have  been  obliged  to 
leave  the  order  as  soon  as  so  doing,  which  has  been  detrimental  to  the  lodges  and 
weakened  it  very  materially.  From  the  commencement  of  our  organization,  I  have 
never  been  able  to  see  the  necessity  of  asking  a  member  to  withdraw  from  the  Order 
because  he  happens  to  be  fortunate  enough  to  rise  to  foremanship,  or  even  start  a 
little  business  for  himself.  I  contend  it  does  not  follow  that  a  member  cannot  be  a 
good  member  still  under  these  circumstances  as  long  as  he  is  willing  to  be  governed 
by  our  laws.  When  we  get  good  men,  I  believe  it  is  our  duty  to  keep  them  if  we  can. 
We  need  more  good  men  than  we  already  have.  I  would  go  as  far  as  to  allow  a  cus- 
tom manufacturer  to  join  the  Order.  For,  if  they  join,  they  must  comply  with  our 
rules.  If  they  do  not  join,  there  is  nothing  to  prevent  them  from  teaching  new  help 
as  much  as  they  please.  It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  our  western  custom  manu- 
facturers are  very  different  from  those  of  the  East,  where  it  is  more  in  the  line  of 
wholesale.  They  arc  all  practical  men  or  nearly  so,  and  are  fully  qualified  to  teach 
new  help,  which  is  the  very  thing  we  are  trjing  to  prevent." 
'  See  Appendi.x  XXXVII. 


154     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

career,  that  some  fellow  workmen  were  always  cutting  the  price  on 
the  sly,  and  helping  out  the  manufacturers  either  directly  or  in- 
directly. After  the  Chinese  labor  threat  had  once  been  carried 
out,  the  opposition  to  green  hands  became  milder,  for  the  man- 
ufacturers had  both  won  the  victory  and  created  a  fear.  The 
shoemakers  who  stayed  out  of  the  Order  have  told  me  there  was 
always  work  enough  for  all;  that  manufacturers  hired  in  green 
hands  or  shut  down  entirely  only  when  demands  of  the  St.  Cris- 
pins were  too  unreasonable  to  allow  for  profits.  The  Massa- 
chusetts shoemakers  never  had  the  rivalry  of  contract  prison 
labor  to  compete  with  as  their  fellow  Crispins  did  in  other  states, 
notably  New  York  and  Pennsylvania,  and  they  never  actually 
suffered  as  those  of  California  did  from  the  Chinese  labor.  The 
"green  hand"  opposition  was  less  intense  as  the  shoemakers  grew 
older,  realized  they  would  have  to  be  replaced  and  that  probably 
all  their  sons  would  not  want  to  learn  to  be  shoemakers.  This 
sentiment  was  voiced  by  Mr.  S.  P.  Cummings,  International 
Grand  Scribe,  in  the  meeting  of  the  Fifth  Grand  Lodge  gathered  in 
Boston  in  1872. 

There  is  another  point  which  I  wish  particularlj^  to  call  your  attention  to, 
and  that  is  the  learning  of  new  "Help."  We  may  all  consider  that  necessary 
to  our  welfare,  but  there  are  many  circumstances  which  demand  that  this 
objection  should  not  be  tolerated,  as  for  instance  the  learning  of  the  orphan 
of  him  who  died  in  his  country's  cause,  as  also  the  learning  of  the  children  of 
other  Trade  Unionists,  who  may  fancy  our  craft.  These  considerations  I 
earnestly  recommend  to  you.  .  .  . 

No  doubt  but  that  there  are  many  members  of  this  convention  who  think, 
while  we  provide  against  the  admission  of  new  help,  that  in  time  we  can  con- 
trol the  price  of  labor,  or,  in  other  words,  sell  our  labor  for  whatever  we 
please.  To  those  who  hold  such  views  I  will  refer  them  to  the  history  of 
trades  unions  in  Germany,  France,  and  England,  and  you  will  see  this  cur- 
tailing the  surplus  help  is  nothing  new  with  us.  In  fact,  it  is  as  old  as  trades 
unions  themselves;  it  has  always  existed,  and  I  trust  it  always  shall  exist,  but 
in  a  different  form  than  we  have  it  at  present  in  the  Crispin  Order.  I  am 
well  aware  there  are  those  who  are  opposed  to  making  any  innovation  upon 
what  are  considered  the  fundamental  principles  of  our  Order.  However,  I 
am  satisfied  in  my  own  mind  that  the  time  is  not  far  distant  when  we  must 
adopt  some  law  for  apprentices;  for  I  claim  it  will  be  more  to  our  advantage 
to  learn  the  youth  of  our  country  than  to  have  foreign  nations  do  so  for  us. 
Now,  what  benefit  shall  we  derive  if  we  should  never  learn  another  shoemaker 
in  this  country  ?  To  my  mind  this  question  seems  plain  enough  —  that  we 
would  gain  but  very  little  by  such  a  course  of  action,  for  European  markets 


THE  HUMAN  ELEMENT  I  55 

would  then  become  the  school  of  instruction  for  the  future  shoemakers  of 
America.  Now,  if  all  trades  adopted  our  rule  in  regard  to  help,  in  another 
generation  there  would  be  no  such  thing  as  an  American  mechanic  in  the 
country.  I  suppose  the  question  will  be  asked,  If  the  prevention  of  new  help 
does  not  maintain  the  price  of  our  labor,  what  will  ?  That,  I  think,  is  the 
question  foremost  in  the  minds  of  many  of  our  members  at  the  present  time, 
and  that  is  what  I  have  often  asked  myself,  and  I  have  arrived  at  this  con- 
clusion: that  in  order  to  restore  confidence  to  the  minds  of  our  members  we 
shall  have  to  convince  them  that  it  is  for  their  interest  to  belong  to  such  an 
order  as  this.  Now,  how  shall  we  be  able  to  convince  them  that  they  will  be 
benefited  by  a  union  of  this  kind  ?  I  would  say,  make  a  reduction  of  wages  a 
grievance,  then  every  member  will  feel  that  he  has  something  to  lean  upon 
in  the  hour  of  his  adversity.  I  feel  confident ,  myself,  that,  unless  we  shall  be 
able  to  make  some  such  grievance  as  this,  we  will  cease  as  an  international 
body  altogether;  and  I  would,  in  all  sincerity,  ask  of  the  delegates  present, 
aye,  and  every  shoemaker  in  the  country.  What  do  you  think  would  be  the 
consequences  then  ?  Why,  simply  this:  for  a  short  period  of  time  some  of 
the  lodges  would  have  a  local  existence,  and  disappear  like  the  dew  drops  on 
the  hillside  before  the  morning  sun.  Such,  my  brothers,  I  honestly  believe 
will  be  our  fate,  unless  we  make  provisions  to  support  lodges  when  they  are 
fighting  our  battles  against  a  reduction  of  wages.  A  reduction  of  wages  in  one 
section  eventually  means  a  reduction  of  wages  over  the  whole  country;  and 
still  how  easy  it  is  for  us  to  prevent  all  this  if  we  only  support  each  other 
against  this  cut-down  system  which  is  practiced  upon  us  so  often.  W'e  will 
then  be  able  to  fight  the  capitalist  with  his  own  weapon,  namely,  capital. 
I  hold  that  without  money  we  can  never  expect,  nor  need  we  hope,  to  be 
successful.  In  fact,  without  money  we  have  about  the  same  chances  of  being 
successful  with  a  capitalist  as  an  unarmed  mob  would  have  to  defeat  an 
armed  and  well  disciplined  army.  I  trust  this  grievance  question  will  receive 
due  consideration  from  every  delegate  present,  for  upon  this  depends  the  life 
or  death  of  our  Order. 

Decline  of  the  Order 

Thus  by  one  of  their  chief  leaders,  the  Crispins  were  told  that 
the  article  of  faith,  the  fight  against  green  hands,  which  made  the 
most  telling  appeal  in  1867-70  when  the  Order  was  recruiting 
members,  had  been  outgrown  and  should  be  put  aside.  At  that 
same  meeting,  the  same  speaker  unconsciously  pronounced  the 
eulogy  of  the  Order. 

Passing  to  the  concluding  topics  of  my  report,  I  must  say  that  I  have  no 
fears  for  the  future  of  this  Order,  because  it  is  founded  in  necessity  and 
justice,  and  cannot  die  until  the  one  is  removed  and  the  other  forgotten. 

Finally,  Brothers,  what  is  to  be  our  future  ?  Are  we  going  up  or  down  ? 
Shall  we  grow  weaker  or  stronger  ?  Five  years  have  passed  since  seven  men 
organized  the  first  lodge.  Since  then  it  has  become  international  as  a  union, 
and  has  a  world-wide  reputation;   but  after  all  its  battles  and  victories,  its 


156     ORGANIZATION  OF  BOOT  AND  SHOE  INDUSTRY 

struggles  and  sacrifices,  what  has  it  accomplished  ?  Accomplished!  It  has 
more  than  lifted  into  respectability  the  craft  it  represents;  it  has  forced  for- 
ward the  discussion  of  the  labor  question  a  quarter  of  a  century  in  five  years! 
I  have  traveled  largely  over  the  country  the  last  three  years,  mingled  with 
lawyers,  politicians,  clergymen  and  editors,  many  of  them  with  world-wide 
reputations,  but  have  never  yet  seen  the  hour  when  I  was  ashamed  to  say, 
"I  am  a  Crispin."  The  Crispin  Order  has  wielded  for  five  years  the  most 
powerful  weapon  avarice,  love  of  power  and  selfish  greed  ever  met,  and 
though  sometimes  the  weapon  may  have  been  turned  aside  or  blunted,  still, 
in  the  number  of  its  battles  and  its  victories,  the  Crispin  Order  stands  with- 
out peer  on  the  Continent.  We  know  labor  has  been  better  paid,  better 
respected,  become  vastly  more  intelligent  because  of  our  existence;  we  know 
how  today  labor  and  its  rights  is  the  absorbing  topic  of  public  and  private 
discussion  —  all  this  the  work  of  five  years. 

The  "Hard  Times  of  1873"  when  manufacturers  had  to  re- 
trench or  give  up  their  business  all  together,  coupled  with  the 
higher  cost  of  living,  felt  most  severely  by  the  working  classes, 
probably  did  much  to  complete  the  decUne  of  the  St.  Crispin 
Order  through  making  its  members  thankful  to  have  work  on  any 
terms  the  manufacturers  would  make.  The  human  element  in 
the  boot  and  shoe  industry,  however,  has  not  ceased  to  be  a 
problem  and  a  factor  to  be  reckoned  w^ith,  in  any  organization 
of  the  industry. 

Close  of  the  First  Factory  Phase  in  1875 

The  year  1875  found  the  boot  and  shoemakers  of  Massa- 
chusetts unorganized  as  laborers,  but  used  to  complex  machinery, 
which  continued  to  revolutionize  the  shoe  industry  both  as  to 
uniformity  and  amount  of  product.  That  year  saw  the  industry 
safely  over  the  "Hard  Times  of  1873,"  recuperating  as  usual  by 
renewed  specialization.  This  time  the  specialization  was  in  the 
Goodyear  Welt  shoes  made  by  a  machine  which,  with,  its  attend- 
ant inventions,  have  made  a  characteristic  group  in  the  develop- 
ment of  a  second  phase  of  the  Factory  Stage,  besides  closing  the 
distinctly  McKay  era  and  the  adoption  of  the  Factory  System. 

The  development  of  the  United  Shoe  Machinery  Company  on 
the  side  of  capital,  and  the  Boot  and  Shoe  Workers  Union  on  the 
side  of  labor,  are  the  most  interesting  as  well  as  the  most  vital 
characteristic  facts  or  elements  of  the  second  phase  of  the  Factory 
Stage,  lasting  from  1875  to  our  own  day. 


APPENDICES 


APPENDICES 


Processes  on  Shoes  in  a  Modern  Factory 

Of  the  loo  or  more  operations  of  a  modern  factory,  more  than  50 
may  be  performed  by  machines.  The  number  of  operations,  both 
hand  and  machine,  varies  with  the  process  and  product  and  the 
equipment  of  the  factory.  These  operations  are  hsted  and  briefly 
described  in  the  following  pages  of  a  bulletin  of  the  United  States  De- 
partment of  Labor  on  Wages  and  Hours  of  Labor  in  the  Boot  and 
Shoe  Industry.  No  attempt  has  been  made  to  explain  or  paraphrase 
them.  They  are  given  to  present  in  bold  relief  a  picture  of  the  com- 
plexity of  modern  shoe  making  in  contrast  with  the  simplicity  of  the 
early  craft. 

A  shoe  factory  usually  has  the  following  departments:  cutting, 
sole  leather,  fitting  or  stitching,  lasting,  bottoming,  finishing,  and 
packing. 

In  the  cutting  department  are  cut  the  several  parts  of  the  uppers, 
the  lining,  and  the  trimmings.  These  parts  pass  to  the  fitting  or 
stitching  department,  where  they  are  sewed  together,  forming  the 
whole  upper. 

In  the  sole-leather  department  the  soles  are  cut,  and  heels,  counters, 
and  boxes  made.  Frequently  these  parts  are  bought  ready-made 
from  factories  making  a  specialty  of  such  manufacture. 

In  the  lasting  department  the  upper,  insole,  counter,  and  box  are 
assembled  and  fitted  together  on  the  shoe  last.  From  this  depart- 
ment the  lasted  shoe  is  sent  to  the  bottoming  department,  where  the 
welt  (in  welt  shoes)  is  sewed  on,  the  outer  sole  sewed  on,  the  heel 
attached,  and  the  heel  and  the  edge  of  the  sole  trimmed  to  shape  and 
finished. 

In  the  finishing  department  the  shoe  is  smoothed  with  a  hot  iron, 
scratches  rubbed  down,  stains  removed,  and  the  shoe  given  a  final 
cleaning  and  inspection.  From  this  department  the  shoes  go  to  the 
packing  department,  where  they  are  boxed  and  cased  for  shipment. 

IS9 


1 60  APPENDICES 

The  occupations  for  which  data  are  shown  are  here  listed  in  alpha- 
betical rather  than  process  order,  under  each  department.  The  de- 
partments, however,  are  listed  in  process  order. 

Cutting  department :  Bed-machine  operators,  male. 

Cutters,  lining,  cloth,  male.  Hand-method    lasting-machine    oper- 

Cutters,  vamp  and  whole  shoe,  hand,         ators,  male. 

male.  Pullers-over,  hand,  male. 

Cutters,  vamp  and  whole  shoe,  ma-  Pullers-over,  machine,  male, 

chine,  male.  Bottoming  department: 

Skivers,  upper,  machine,  male.  Buffers,  male. 

Skivers,  upper,  machine,  female.  Edge  setters,  male. 

Sole-leather  department:  Edge  trimmers,  male. 

Channelers,  insole  and  outsole,  male.  Goodyear  stitchers,  male. 

Cutters,  outsole,  male.  Goodyear  welters,  male. 

Fitting  or  stitching  department:  Heel  breasters,  male. 

Backstay  stitchers,  female.  Heel  burnishers,  male. 

Button  fasteners,  female.  Heelers,  male. 

Buttonhole  makers,  female.  Heel  scourers,  male. 

Closers-on,  female.  Heel-seat  nailers,  male. 

Lining  makers,  female.  Heel  sluggers,  male. 

Tip  stitchers,  female.  Heel  trimmers  or  shavers,  male. 

Top  stitchers  or  undertrimmers,  fe-  Levelers,  male, 

male.  McKay  sewers,  male. 

Vampers,  male.  Rough  rounders,  male. 

Vampers,  female.  Finishing  department: 

Lasting  department:  Treers  or  ironers,  hand,  male. 

Assemblers,  for  pulling-over  machine,  Treers  or  ironers,  hand,  female, 
male. 

Cutting  Department 

All  operations  of  the  cutting  department  here  shown  are  usually 
performed  by  men,  except  skiving,  on  which  operation  women  also  are 
employed. 

Cutters,  Lining,  Cloth.  —  Included  in  this  occupation  are  the  men 
who  cut  the  cloth  lining  of  the  upper  of  the  shoe.  The  work  may  be 
performed  by  hand  or  machine.  The  hand  cutter  receives  the  cloth 
folded  8  to  12  thick.  He  lays  his  patterns  on  the  cloth  and  draws  a 
knife  along  the  edge  of  the  pattern,  cutting  through  the  several  thick- 
nesses of  cloth.  The  machine  operator  uses  a  die  which,  under  the 
pressure  of  a  power  machine,  cuts  24  to  32  thicknesses  at  one  time. 

Cutters,  Vamp  and  Whole  Shoe,  Hand.  —  This  occupation  includes 
the  men  who  cut  by  hand  the  entire  top  or  outside  of  the  shoe.  It 
covers  the  men  who  cut  the  vamp  and  possibly  some  or  all  of  the  other 
part  of  the  top  also,  but  does  not  include  cutters  of  minor  parts  only. 


APPENDICES  l6l 

The  vamp  is  the  most  important  part  of  the  upper  and  requires  the 
greatest  skill  in  cutting.  It  consists  of  the  part  or  parts  of  the  upper 
attached  to  the  sole.  The  upper,  according  to  the  style  of  the  shoe, 
may  have  other  parts  also,  as  quarters,  tongue,  tip,  backstay,  and 
foxing.  The  operator  has  a  bench  upon  which  he  spreads  the  skin;  he 
lays  the  pattern  in  the  desired  place  and  draws  a  knife  along  the  edge 
of  the  pattern,  cutting  the  part  to  the  desired  shape.  For  each  dif- 
ferent part  of  the  upper  there  is  a  separate  pattern.  Incidental  to  the 
outside  cutting  care  must  be  exercised  in  selecting  like  qualities  and 
weights  of  stock  for  the  same  parts  in  a  pair  of  shoes. 

Cutters,  Vamp  and  Whole  Shoe,  Machine.  —  These  operators  cut  the 
same  part  or  parts  as  the  hand  cutters  described  above.  Instead  of 
patterns  and  a  knife  they  use  dies  operated  by  a  power  press.  Dif- 
ferent dies  are  required  for  each  part  of  each  style  and  size  of  shoe. 
The  cutting  board  is  similar  to  that  used  by  the  hand  worker,  with  a 
beam  over  it  which  can  be  swung  either  to  the  left  or  right  and  any 
position  over  the  board.  The  cutter  places  the  die  in  the  desired  posi- 
tion on  the  leather,  grasps  the  handle  of  the  beam  of  the  clicking  ma- 
chine and  swings  it  over  the  die,  with  a  downward  pressure.  A  clutch 
is  placed  in  operation,  which  brings  the  beam  downward,  pressing  the 
die  through  the  leather.  After  the  cut  the  beam  automatically  returns 
to  its  full  height  and  remains  there  until  the  handle  is  pressed  again. 

Skivers,  Upper,  Machine.  —  Skiving  consists  of  cutting  away,  on  the 
flesh  side,  the  edge  of  a  piece  of  leather,  so  that  the  edge  may  be  turned 
and  pasted  back,  thus  giving  a  finished  rather  than  a  raw  edge  of  the 
same  thickness  as  the  other  parts  of  the  leather.  The  machine  used  has 
a  sharp-edged  revolving  disk  so  shaped  as  to  cut  the  desired  bevel  or 
shoulder  on  the  leather  fed  to  it. 

Sole-Leather  Department 

The  two  operations  of  this  department  for  which  data  are  shown 
are  performed  by  men. 

Channelers,  Insole  and  Outsole.  —  The  operator  has  a  machine  that 
cuts  a  slit  near  the  edge  of  a  welt  insole  or  a  McKay  outsole.  The  sHt 
extends  only  part  way  through  the  sole  and  is  cut  at  an  acute  angle. 
The  lip  or  lid  of  the  chamicl  is  turned  back  by  a  channel  turner.  The 
channel  in  the  outsole  of  the  welt  shoe  is  cut  by  the  rough  rounder. 
The  channel  in  the  welt  insole  avoids  a  seam  inside  the  shoe  and  per- 
mits the  insole,  the  welt,  and  the  upper  to  be  stitched  together  while 
on  the  last.   In  the  outsole  the  channel  permits  the  seam  to  be  counter- 


l62  APPENDICES 

sunk  or  embedded  in  the  sole.  After  the  outsole  is  stitched  on,  the  lip 
of  the  channel  is  cemented  down  on  the  thread,  protecting  it  from 

wear. 

Cutters,  Outsole.  —  The  operator  cuts  the  outsole  from  a  side  of 
leather  by  means  of  a  die  and  a  heavy  descending  power  beam.  The 
leather  is  laid  upon  the  cutting  table,  the  cutter  places  the  die,  and 
with  his  foot  presses  a  lever,  releasing  the  beam,  which  comes  down 
upon  the  die  with  sufficient  force  to  press  it  through  the  leather.  The 
operator  sets  the  die  to  have  as  little  waste  leather  as  possible,  and  to 
have  the  same  quality  of  leather  in  a  sole. 

Fitting  or  Stitching  Department 

Women  are  employed  so  generally  in  this  part  of  the  manufacture  of 
/a  shoe  that  data  are  shown  for  females  only  in  all  occupations  reported 
except  vamping,  in  which  occupation  wages  are  shown  for  both  sexes. 
All  of  these  are  machine  operations. 

Backstay  Stitchers.  —  The  back  of  the  shoe  is  usually  strengthened 
by  an  additional  strip  running  all  or  part  of  the  way  from  the  top  to  the 
sole  of  the  shoe.  This  stay  is  sewed  on  over  the  back  seam.  This  work 
is  also  called  back  stripping. 

Button  Fasteners.  —  This  is  an  automatic  machine  operation.  The 
buttor\s  are  fastened  on  the  shoe  by  either  thread  or  wire.  The  vipper 
comes  to  the  operator  with  the  position  marked  for  each  button.  The 
operator  has  only  to  put  the  top  of  the  shoe  in  position  and  start  and 
stop  her  machine. 

Buttonhole  Makers.— The  upper  is  received  by  the  operator  with 
the  position  of  each  buttonhole  marked.  The  machine  cuts  and  works 
the  buttonhole  automatically.  The  operator  has  only  to  hold  the  upper 
in  position  and  control  the  machine. 

Closers-on.  —  This  operation  consists  of  stitching  the  lining  to  the 
top  of  the  upper,  both  of  these  parts  having  been  made  previously. 
The  work  is  also  called  inseaming.  This  operation  is  not  performed  on 
all  shoes.  In  some  shops  it  is  omitted  entirely;  in  others  the  lining  is 
pasted  on,  which  holds  it  to  the  top  until  the  upper  is  top-stitched. 

Lining  Makers.  —  These  employees  are  sewing-machine  operators 
who  sew  together  the  several  parts  of  the  shoe  lining.  In  some  shops 
the  work  is  subdivided,  two  or  more  persons  doing  a  part  of  the  work 
on  each  Hning.  This  operation  of  sewing  the  cloth  lining  requires  less 
skill  than  the  leather-sewing  operations,  to  which  lining  makers  are 
usually  advanced  as  they  acquire  skill. 


APPENDICES  163 

Tip  Stitchers.  —  The  tip  is  a  separate  piece  of  leather  generally  put 
over  the  toe  of  the  shoe.   It  is  stitched  to  the  vamp  by  machine. 

Top  Stitchers  or  Undertrimmcrs.  —  When  the  lining  has  been  closed 
on  to  the  top  of  the  upper,  it  is  folded  inside  of  the  upper  covering  the 
closing-on  seam  and  passed  to  the  top  stitcher  who  stitches,  by  ma- 
chine, the  edge  of  the  folded-in  seam.  This  operation  is  also  called 
undcrtrimming.  In  some  shops  this  top  stitching  is  done  without  a 
previous  closing-on,  the  lining  being  held  in  position  or  previously 
pasted. 

Vampers.  —  The  vamp  is  the  part  of  the  upper  to  which  the  sole  is 
attached.  Vamping  is  the  process  of  sewing  together  the  lower  part  of 
the  shoe,  or  vamp,  and  the  upper  part,  known  as  top  or  quarter. 
Pumps  or  slippers  having  no  tops  or  quarters  do  not  require  vamping.  ^ 
Vamping  is  the  most  important  and  best-paid  operation  in  the  titling 
room.  The  operator  uses  cither  a  single  or  double  needle  power  vamp 
sewing  machine.  Either  males  or  females  may  operate  the  machine; 
women's  shoes  being  light  can  be  vamped  by  females,  but  men's  shoes 
being  heavier  require  male  vampers  usually;  however,  in  many  plants 
making  men's  shoes  only,  there  are  women  vampers. 

Lasting  Department 

Men  are  employed  almost  exclusively  in  the  operations  of  the  last- 
ing room. 

Assemblers,  for  Pulling-Over  Machine.  — The  assembler  receives  the 
last  with  the  insole  tacked  on  it.  He  wets  the  leather,  shellacs  the  toe 
box  or  the  lip  or  Ijoth,  places  the  toe  box  and  counter  between  the 
lining  and  ihe  upper,  and  then  puts  the  last  inside  llie  upper.  Ha\ing 
centered  the  upper  on  the  last,  he  places  the  last  on  the  spindle  of  the 
assembling  machine.  By  pressing  a  lever  the  machine  automatically 
drives  small  tacks  through  the  upper  and  insole  into  the  bottom  of  the 
last  at  the  toe,  the  heel,  and  either  side,  the  tacks  holding  the  upper  in 
place  temporarily.  The  shoe  goes  from  the  assembler  to  the  machine 
puller-over.  When  the  pulling-over  is  a  hand  operation,  the  assembling 
is  done  by  tlie  hand  puller-over. 

Bed-Machitic  Operators.  —  Lasting  is  the  next  operation  after  the 
shoe  has  been  pulled  over  tiu'  last.  The  bed-machine  operator  places 
the  shoe  on  the  machine  and  by  levers  moves  a  series  of  wipers  (friction 
pullers)  which  draw  the  upj^er  over  the  edge  of  the  insole  at  the  toe  and 
heel.  Some  factories  designate  this  as  toe  and  heel  lasting.  The  shoe  is 
placed  with  the  sole  up  and  the  operator  determines  whether  the  shoe 


V 


164  APPENDICES 

is  properly  lasted  by  placing  his  hand  under  the  toe  or  heel.  The 
wipers  are  kept  in  motion  until  the  operator  is  satisfied  that  the  upper 
has  been  wiped  into  the  desired  position.  Under  the  welt  system,  the 
operator  drives  a  tack  through  the  upper  and  insole  and  partly  into 
the  last  at  one  side  and  passes  a  fine  wire  from  it  around  the  drawn-in 
upper  at  the  toe  to  the  opposite  side  of  the  last  and  drives  a  tack, 
around  which  he  winds  the  wire.  The  wire  holds  the  toe  of  the  upper 
in  position  as  drawn  in  over  the  last.  Under  the  McKay  system,  in- 
stead of  the  wire  used  on  the  toe  of  welt  shoes,  tacks  are  used.  The 
upper  at  the  heel  is  fastened  by  tacks  driven  in  by  hand.  In  case  the 
side  is  lasted  by  the  bed-machine  laster  the  side  or  instep  is  lasted  by 
hand  with  pincers.  The  operator  draws  the  upper  tightly  over  the 
last  so  that  there  are  no  wrinkles  and  tacks  it  down  by  hand.  Lasting 
is  one  of  the  most  important  operations  in  the  making  of  a  shoe. 

Hand-Method  Lasting-Machine  Operators.  —  In  this  method  of  last- 
ing, which  is  done  on  a  machine  known  either  as  "consolidated"  or 
"niggerhead,"  the  operator  holds  the  edge  of  the  shoe  so  that  the 
pincers  of  the  machine  grasp  the  upper  and  draw  it  evenly  and  closely 
about  the  last.  Immediately  following  the  pincers  as  fast  as  the  upper 
is  drawn  into  position,  there  is  a  device  on  the  machine  that  drives 
tacks  automatically  into  the  last  to  hold  the  upper  in  its  proper  place. 
In  case  any  part  of  the  shoe  has  not  been  properly  lasted,  the  operator 
pulls  the  tacks  and  does  the  work  over.  Under  the  welt  system  this 
machine  is  often  used  to  last  only  the  side  or  instep  while  the  bed  ma- 
chine lasts  the  toe  and  heel,  thus  cutting  out  the  operation  of  hand 
lasting  the  side  or  instep,  which  is  necessary  in  plants  using  only  the 
bed  machines. 

Pullers-Over,  Hand.  —  The  hand  puller-over  is  his  own  assembler, 
which  occupation  is  described  above.  With  the  parts  assembled,  he 
takes  hand  pincers  and  draws  the  upper  over  the  last  and  insole,  tak- 
ing care  that  the  upper  keeps  its  proper  position,  and  drives  a  tack  at 
the  toe  and  two  on  either  side  to  hold  the  upper  in  position  for  the 
laster. 

Pullers-Over,  Machine.  —  Where  shoes  are  pulled  over  by  machine, 
they  are  first  assembled  and  put  over  the  last  by  the  assembler.  The 
machine-puller  places  the  shoe  in  the  machine  and  the  pincers  of  the 
machine  grasp  the  leather  at  different  points  on  each  side  of  the  shoe. 
The  operator  stands  so  that  he  can  see  when  the  upper  is  properly 
centered.  He  presses  a  foot  lever  closing  the  pincers,  which  draw  the 
leather  securely  against  the  last.  The  machine  stops  at  this  point  and 


APPENDICES  165 

the  operator  can  start  or  stop  the  machine  at  will.  The  operator  now 
examines  the  shoe  to  see  whether  all  the  parts  have  been  evenly  pulled 
over  the  last.  Where  a  part  has  not  been  properly  pulled  over  it  can  be 
adjusted  to  the  desired  point  by  levers.  When  satisfied  that  the  shoe 
is  properly  adjusted,  the  operator  presses  a  foot  lever,  the  pincers 
move  toward  each  other,  drawing  the  leather  around  the  last,  and  at 
the  same  time  the  machine  automatically  drives  two  tacks  on  each 
side  and  one  at  the  top  through  the  upper  and  insole  into  the  last  to 
hold  the  upper  in  position. 

Bottoming  Department 

All  operations  in  the  bottoming  department  are  usually  performed 
by  men.  ~~^ 

Buffers.  —  After  the  shoe  has  been  bottomed,  the  buffer  removes 
stains  from  the  sole  and  gives  it  a  smooth,  finished  appearance  by 
holding  it  against  a  revolving  roll  Qr  wheel  covered  with  sandpaper 
or  emery  paper. 

Edge  Setters.  —  The  edge  setter  holds  the  edge  of  the  sole  against  a 
machine  having  hot  irons  shaped  to  fit  the  edge  of  the  sole,  which  irons 
vibrate  rapidly  and  give  a  lasting  polish  to  the  edge. 

Edge  Trimmers.  —  The  operator  holds  the  edge  of  the  sole  against  a 
machine  having  a  series  of  revolving  knives  that  trim  the  edge  smooth 
and  to  the  desired  shape.  This  operation  comes  after  the  bottom  has 
been  sewed  on  and  precedes  edge  setting. 

Goodyear  Stitchers.  —  The  operator  uses  a  Goodyear  outsole  lock- 
stitch machine  to  stitch  the  outsole  to  the  welt.  The  seam  is  run  in  the 
charmel  in  the  outsole  through  both  outsole  and  welt  on  the  outside  of 
the  shoe.  The  stitches  show  on  the  upper  surface  of  the  welt  and  are 
covered  on  the  under  surface  of  the  sole  by  cementing  down  the  lip  of 
the  channel. 

Goodyear  Welters.  —  The  welt  is  a  narrow  strip  of  leather  to  which 
the  outsole  is  to  be  stitched.  It  extends  around  the  edge  of  the  shoe  as 
far  back  as  the  breast  of  the  heel.  By  one  operation  of  the  machine 
both  the  upper  and  the  welt  are  sewed  to  the  insole,  the  thread  passing 
through  the  slit  of  the  channel  in  the  insoles.  The  outsole  is  stitched  to 
the  welt  in  a  later  operation. 

Heel  Breasters.  —  The  heel  breaster  operates  a  machine  having  a 
knife  which  cuts  to  shape  and  trims  evenly  the  breast  or  front  surface 
of  the  heel,  cutting  down  to  the  outsole,  but  not  cutting  into  it. 


l66  APPENDICES 

Heel  Burnishers.  —  The  final  operation  on  the  heel  is  the  burnishing. 
The  operator  holds  the  shoe  with  his  hand  in  such  position  that  the 
heel  comes  in  contact  with  a  wheel  on  the  burnishing  machine,  which 
gives  it  a  hard,  smooth  surface.  Hot  wax  is  carried  to  the  heel  by  a 
small  disk  and  applied  by  a  series  of  rubbing  blows,  which  beat  the  wax 
thoroughly  into  the  heel.  A  revolving  brush  on  the  same  machine 
brings  the  heel  to  a  perfectly  smooth  surface. 
\^  j  Heelers.  —  The  heels  come  to  the  heeler  ready-made,  except  for  the 
top  lift  or  last  layer  of  leather.  A  helper  sticks  nails  in  a  steel  plate. 
The  heeler  places  the  shoe  on  a  jack  or  metal  last,  puts  the  heel  in 
position,  swings  the  nail  plate  into  position  over  the  heel  when  the  nails 
are  dropped  into  another  plate  over  the  heel.  By  operating  a  foot  lever 
another  part  of  the  machine  drives  the  nails  down  through  the  heel, 
the  insole,  and  the  upper  folded  between  the  insole  and  the  heel,  and 
clinches  the  nails  back  into  the  leather  of  the  insole.  The  nails  pro- 
trude slightly  above  the  unfinished  heel.  The  top  lift,  coated  with 
cement,  is  then  pressed  down  by  the  machine  on  the  protruding  nails. 

Heel  Scourers.  —  This  operator  holds  the  shoe  by  hand  so  the  heel, 
trimmed  but  yet  not  smooth,  comes  in  contact  with  rolls  covered  with 
sandpaper,  which  smooth  the  heel.  The  next  operation  on  the  heel  is 
burnishing. 

Heel-Seat  Nailers.  —  The  heel  seat  is  the  heel  end  of  the  sole.  The 
insole,  the  outsole,  and  the  part  of  the  upper  brought  in  between  them 
are  nailed  together  by  machine.  Small  brass  nails  are  driven  auto- 
matically through  the  parts  and  clinched  on  the  insole  side.  The  shoe 
is  placed  on  a  jack  and  the  work  of  the  operator  is  to  guide  it  during  the 
nailing. 

Heel  Sluggers.  —  The  slugger  operates  a  machine  which  drives  small 
pieces  of  brass  or  other  metal,  called  "slugs,"  into  the  toplift  of  the 
heel  to  protect  it  from  wear.  The  operator  of  this  machine  adjusts 
the  plate  so  as  to  place  accurately  the  desired  number  of  slugs,  and 
the  machine  automatically  cuts  off  and  drives  the  slugs  as  they  are 
drawn  from  a  coil  of  wire. 

Heel  Trimmers  or  Shavers.  —  The  heel,  when  the  shoe  is  received 
from  the  heeler,  is  rough  and  larger  than  the  required  size.  This 
opera^tor  holds  the  shoe  by  hand  in  such  position  that  the  heel  comes  in 
contact  with  a  series  of  revolving  knives  on  his  machine  which  cut 
away  the  heel  to  conform  to  the  desired  contour,  as  indicated  by  the 
top  lift,  which  top  lift  is  of  exact  size  when  put  on  by  the  heeler.  The 
machine  has  two  sets  of  knives.  With  the  first  set  the  trimmer  shaves 


APPENDICES  167 

that  part  of  the  heel  from  the  top  lift  to  the  sole,  then  with  the  other 
set  he  trims  the  edge  of  the  sole,  taking  care  not  to  cut  the  upper. 

Levelers.  —  The  operation  of  leveling  to  correct  any  unevenness  in 
the  bottom  of  the  shoe  is  done  with  an  automatic  sole-leveling  ma- 
chine. The  operator  places  the  shoe  on  a  jack  or  metal  last,  which  he 
attaches  to  the  machine,  where  it  is  securely  held  by  the  spindle  and  a 
toe  rest.  He  presses  a  foot  lever  and  the  shoe  passes  automatically 
beneath  a  roll  under  heavy  pressure.  This  roll  moves  with  a  vibrating 
motion  over  the  middle  of  the  sole  of  the  shoe  from  the  toe  down  to  and 
into  the  shank  and  passes  back  again  to  the  toe.  The  roll  then  cants  to 
the  right  and  repeats  the  operation  on  that  side  of  the  sole,  returning 
to  the  toe  as  before.  It  then  cants  to  the  left,  repeating  the  operation 
on  that  side,  after  which  the  shoe  automatically  drops  forward  and 
is  relieved  from  the  pressure.  While  one  shoe  is  under  pressure  the 
operator  is  preparing  another  shoe  for  the  operation. 

McKay  Sealers.  —  This  operator  uses  a  McKay  sewing  machine  to 
sew  together  the  outsole,  the  upper,  and  the  insole  —  the  three  parts 
being  sewed  together  in  the  one  operation,  except  the  heel  seat,  which 
is  nailed.  No  welt  is  used  in  the  McKay  process,  the  seam  being  em- 
bedded in  the  channel  of  the  outsole ;  the  opposite  side  of  the  seam  is  on 
the  inside  of  the  shoe  instead  of  on  the  top  of  the  welt  outside  the  shoe, 
as  in  the  welt  process  of  manufacture. 

Rough  Rounders.  —  This  operation  consists  of  trimming  by  machine 
the  edge  of  the  outsole  and  welt  so  that  they  will  extend  a  uniform  dis- 
tance from  the  upper.  It  is  the  first  operation  on  the  edge  of  the  sole  in 
the  Goodyear  process.  The  machine  also  cuts  a  channel  in  the  outsole, 
in  which  the  thread  is  embedded,  when  the  Goodyear  stitching  is  done 
later. 

Finishing  Department 

Treers  or  Ironers,  Hand.  —  The  treer  places  the  shoe  on  a  form,  the 
shape  of  a  last,  supported  on  a  frame.  By  pressing  a  foot  lever  the 
form  is  expanded  so  that  the  shoe  fits  tight  over  it.  The  tools  of  the 
treer  are  a  hot  iron,  brush,  cloth,  etc.  The  treer  brushes  the  shoe, 
cleans  spots  and  discolorations,  remedies  any  slight  cut  or  blemish,  and 
rubs  the  upper  with  a  hot  iron  to  take  out  wrinkles  and  produce  a 
smooth  surface. — Bulletin  of  the  United  States  Bureau  of  Labor  Statis- 
tics, No.  134,  pp.  22-31. 


1 68  APPENDICES 

II 

Modern  Shoe  Repairing 

[Not  only  in  making  but  in  repairing  shoes  in  these  days  are  elabo- 
rate machines  deemed  necessary  so  that  the  old-time  cobbler  cannot 
even  repair  a  shoe  with  his  old  kit  now  in  competition  with  such  a 
repair  outfit  as  this  one  described  below.] 

American  ingenuity  was  exemplified  this  afternoon  in  the  presenta- 
tion by  George  W.  Brown,  vice-president  of  the  United  Shoe  Ma- 
chinery Company,  to  Brig.-Gen.  Sweetser's  command  of  a  complete 
shoe  repairing  unit,  mounted  on  wheels.  The  truck  and  trailer  is  the 
first  equipment  of  its  kind  provided  for  the  comfort  of  the  infantryman 
in  any  of  the  armies  of  the  world. 

Mr.  Brown  presented  the  motor-driven  vehicle  to  the  brigade  on  the 
muster  field,  in  the  presence  of  Gen.  Sweetser  and  his  staflf.  He  said,  in 
part: 

When  the  United  States  entered  the  war,  our  president,  E.  P.  Brown,  gave 
directions  that  the  equipment  that  you  see  here  be  constructed,  that  the  Mas- 
sachusetts troops  might  have  the  benefit  of  it.  Any  efifort  along  this  line  is 
essentially  experimental.  It  is  much  more  of  a  problem  to  repair  shoes  by 
machinery  than  it  is  to  manufacture  new  shoes  of  whatever  grade  by  ma- 
chinery. 

This  equipment  has  a  capacity  of  resoling  approximately  400  pair  of  shoes 
daily.  It  has  storage  place  for  all  the  materials  necessary  for  protecting  its 
supply  department.  It  is  equipped  with  all  the  duphcate  parts  necessary  to 
prevent  a  delay  in  operations  incidental  to  wear,  tear  and  breakdown.  This 
applies  to  repairing  machinery,  electrical  equipment,  motor-truck,  and 
trailer. 

It  is  thought  by  military  men  that  the  greatest  need  of  repairing  ma- 
chinery would  be  immediately  after  the  unit  to  which  it  is  attached  had  com- 
pleted a  march.  In  order  that  it  may  be  immediately  available  at  that  time, 
sleeping  accommodations  have  been  provided,  that  the  men  who  operate  the 
machines  may  sleep  while  the  army  is  marching,  and  be  ready  to  operate  the 
machinery  during  the  entire  night  following  a  march.  Means  are  provided 
for  lighting  the  entire  equipment  by  electricity. 

Gen.  Sweetser,  in  accepting  the  equipment,  said,  in  part: 

On  the  foot  efficiency  of  the  soldier  depends  the  ultimate  success  of  the 
army  in  the  field.  The  seasoned  soldier,  once  he  has  broken  in  a  pair  of  shoes, 
can  travel  farther  and  better  if  they  are  kept  in  good  condition,  and  I  con- 
sider this  outfit  which  the  United  Shoe  Machinery  Company  has  offered  to 
be  of  inestimable  value. 


APPENDICES  1 69 

As  far  as  I  can  ascertain,  this  repairing  outfit  is  the  first  of  its  kind  in  our 
country,  if  not  in  the  world.  It  is  really  of  greater  value  that  the  soldiers 
have  such  an  apparatus,  which  will  ensure  them  comfortable  shoes,  than  to 
have  an  unlimited  supply  of  new  shoes  available.  From  an  economic  view- 
point this  shoe-repairing  outfit  serves  an  important  function  in  the  con- 
servation of  material.  — Boston  Herald,  August  15,  1917. 


Ill 

Mediaeval  Shoemaking  Tools 

The  bones  of  St.  Hugh,  a  shoemaker  who  became  a  martyr,  were 
found  hanging  in  a  tree  by  his  comrades.  Out  of  them,  they  devised, 
according  to  tradition,  a  full  kit  of  tools  necessary  for  a  mediaeval 
shoemaker. 

My  friends,  I  pray  you  listen  to  me. 
And  mark  what  S.  Hugh's  Bones  shall  be. 

First,  a  Drawer  and  a  Dresser, 

Two  Wedges,  a  more  and  a  lesser; 
A  pretty  Block  Three  Inches  high, 

In  fashion  squared  like  a  Die. 

Which  shall  be  call'd  by  proper  Name, 

A  Heel-Block,  ah,  the  very  same: 
A  Hand-leather  and  a  Thumb-leather  likewise, 

To  pull  out  Shoe-thread  we  must  devise. 

The  Needle  and  the  Thimble  shall  not  be  left  alone, 

The  Pincers,  the  Pricking-awl  and  Rubbing  Stone 
The  Awl,  Steel  and  Tacks,  the  sowing  Hairs. beside. 

The  Stirrop  holding  fast,  while  we  sow  the  Cow-hide, 
The  Whetstone,  the  Stopping-stick,  and  the  Paring  knife, 

All  this  doth  belong  to  a  Journey-man's  Life: 
Our  Apron  is  the  Shrine  to  wrap  these  bones  in; 

Thus  shroud  we  S.  Hugh's  Bones  in  a  gentle  Lamb's  Skin. 

Reprinted  from 

The   Delightful   Princely   and   Entertaining   History  of  the 
Gcntlccrafl.    Published  in  London,  1725.    pp.  55-56. 


lyo  APPENDICES 


IV 

Partial   Contents  of  the  Delightful  Princely  and  Enter- 
taining History  of  the  Gentle  Craft 

VIII.   How  the  Lady  Ursula  finding  herself  to  be  with  Child,  made  great 
Moan  unto  her  Husband  Crispine,  &c. 
IX.   How  fair  Ursula  came  before  her  Father  with  Crispine  her  Hus- 
band, who  w^as  joyfully  received  by  him,  &c. 
X.   How  Sir  Simon  Eyre  being  at  first  a  Shooemaker,  became  in  the 
End  Lord-Mayor  of  London,  thro'  the  Counsel  of  his  Wife,  &c. 
XI.   How  Simon  Eyre  was  sent  for  to  my  Lord-Mayor's  to  Supper,  and 

shewing  the  great  Entertainment  he  and  his  Wife  had  there. 
XII.   How  John  the  Frenchman  fell  in  Love  with  one  of  his  Mistress's 
Maids. 

XIII.  How  Master  Eyre  was  called  upon  to  be  Sheriff  of  London,  and 
how  he  held  his  Place  with  Worship. 

XIV.  How  Haunce  having  circumvented  John  the  Frenchman's  Love, 
was  by  him  and  others  finely  deceived  at  the  Garden. 

XV.   How  Master  Alderman  Eyre  was  chosen  Lord-Mayor  of  London; 
and  how  he  feasted  the  Apprentices  on  Shrove-Tuesday. 
A  New  Love  Dialogue  betw-een  a  Young  Lady  and  a  Shooemaker. 
A  Shooe-maker's  Widow's  Question  to  her  Man  whom  she  fell  in 
Love  with.     His  Answer. 
XVI.   Of  the  Green  King  of  St.  Martins,  and  his  merry  Feats. 
XVII.   How  the  Green  King  went  a  Walking  with  his  wife,  and  got  An- 
thony Now  Now  to  play  before  them,  in  which  sort  he  went  with 
her  to  Bristol. 

The  Shooe-maker's  Glory;  Being  a  Merry  Song  in  the  Praise  of 
Shooe-maker's,  to  be  sung  by  them  every  Year  on  the  25th  of 
October. 


A  Contemporary  Account  of  New  England  Trades  in 

1650 1 

All  other  trades  have  here  fallen  into  their  ranks  and  places  to  their 
great  advantage;  especially  Coopers  and  Shoemakers  who  had  either 
of  them  a  Corporation  granted,  inriching  themselves  by  their  trades 
very  much.  ...  As  for  Tanners  and  Shoemakers,  it  being  naturalized 
into  these  occupations,  to  have  a  higher  reach  in  managing  their  manu- 
factures than  other  men  in  New  England  are,  having  not  changed  their 

'  Cf.  Edward  Johnson:  Wonder  Working  Providence  of  Sion's  Savior  in  New- 
England,  pp.  207-209,  Book  3,  Chap.  6,  in  edition  of  1654. 


APPENDICES  lyi 

nature  in  this,  between  them  both  they  have  kept  men  to  their  stand- 
ard hitherto,  almost  doubUng  the  price  of  their  commodities  according 
to  the  rate  they  were  sold  for  in  England,  and  yet  the  plenty  of  Leather 
is  beyond  what  they  had  there,  counting  the  number  of  people,  but  the 
transportation  of  Boots  and  Shoes  into  forraign  parts  hath  vented  all 
however;  as  for  Tailors,  they  have  not  come  behind  the  former,  their 
advantage  being  in  the  nurture  of  new  fashions;  .  .  .  Carpenters, 
Joyners,  Glaziers,  Painters  follow  their  trades  only;  Gun-smiths, 
Locksmiths,  Blacksmiths,  Naylers,  Cutlers,  have  left  the  husbandmen 
to  follow  the  Plough  and  the  Cart,  and  they  their  trades,  Weavers, 
Brewers,  Bakers,  Costermongers,  Feltmakers,  Braziers,  Pewterers  and 
Tinkers,  Ropemakcrs,  Masons  and  Tile  makers,  Cardmakers  to  work 
and  not  to  play.  Turners,  Pump  makers  and  Wheelers,  Glovers.  .  .  . 
and  Furriers  are  orderly  turned  to  their  trade,  besides  divers  sorts  of 
Shopkeepers  and  some  who  have  a  mystery  beyond  others,  as  have 
the  Vintners. 

VI 

The  Charter  of  the  Company  of  Shoomakers,  Boston,  1648 

Vppon  the  petition  of  the  shoomakers  of  Boston  &  in  consideration 
of  the  complaynts  which  haue  bin  made  of  the  damag  which  the 
country  sustaynes  by  occasion  of  bad  ware  made  by  some  of  that  trade, 
for  redresse  hereof,  is  it  ordred,  &  the  Court  doth  hereby  graunt  hbtie 
&  powre  vnto  Richard  Webb,  James  Euerill,  Robt.  Turner,  Edmund 
Jackson  &  the  rest  of  the  shoomakers  inhabiting  &  howskeepers  in 
Boston,  or  the  greatest  number  of  them,  vppon  due  notice  giuen  to  the 
rest,  to  assemble  &  meete  together  in  Boston,  at  such  time  and  times  as 
they  shall  appoynt,  who  beinge  so  assembled,  they,  or  the  greater 
number  of  them,  shall  haue  powre  to  chuse  a  master,  &  two  wardens, 
with  fowre  or  six  associates,  a  clarke,  a  sealer,  a  searcher,  &  a  beadle, 
with  such  other  officers  as  they  shall  find  nessessarie;  &  these  officers  & 
ministers,  as  afToresd,  every  yeare  or  oftener,  in  case  of  death  or  de- 
parture out  of  this  jurisdiction,  or  remoueall  for  default,  which  officers 
&  ministers  shall  each  of  thorn  take  an  oath  sutable  to  their  places 
before  the  Gounor  or  some  of  the  magists,  the  same  being  pscribed  or 
allowed  by  this  Court;  &  the  sd  shoomakers  being  so  assembled  as 
before,  or  at  any  other  meetinge  or  assembly  tobe  appoynted  from 
time  to  time  by  the  master  &  wardens,  or  master  or  wardens  with  two 
of  the  associats,  shall  haue  power  to  make  orders  for  the  well  gouern- 


172  APPENDICES 

inge  of  theire  company,  in  the  mannaginge  of  their  trade  &  all  the 
aflfayres  therevnto  belonging  &  to  change  &  reforme  the  same  as  oc- 
casion shall  require  &  to  aiiex  reasonable  pennalties  for  the  breach  of 
the  same;  provided,  that  none  of  theire  sd  orders,  nor  any  alteration 
therein,  shalbe  of  force  before  they  shalbe  pvsed  &  allowed  of  by  the 
Court  of  that  county,  or  by  the  Court  of  Assistants.  And  for  the  better 
executing  such  orders,  the  sd  master  &  wardens,  or  any  two  of  them 
with  4  or  6  associats,  or  any  three  of  them,  shall  haue  power  to  heare  & 
determine  all  offences  agaynst  any  of  theire  sd  orders,  &  may  inflict 
pennalties  pscribed  as  aforesd,  &  assesse  fines  to  the  vallew  of  forty 
shillings  or  vnder  for  one  offence,  &  the  clarke  shall  giue  warrent  in 
writinge  to  the  beadle  to  leuie  the  same,  who  shall  haue  power  there 
vppon  to  leuie  the  same  by  distresse,  as  is  vsed  in  other  cases;  &  all  the 
sd  fines  and  forfeitures  shall  be  imployed  to  the  benefit  of  the  sd  com- 
pany of  shoomakers  in  generall,  &  to  no  other  vse.  And  vppon  the 
complaynt  of  the  sd  master  &  wardens,  or  their  atturny  or  advocate,  in 
the  County  Court,  of  any  pson  or  psons  who  shall  vse  the  art  or  trade 
of  a  shoomaker,  or  any  pt  thereof,  not  beinge  approued  of  by  the 
officere  of  ye  sd  shoomakers  to  be  a  sufficient  workman,  the  sd  Court 
shall  haue  power  to  send  for  such  psons,  &  suppresse  them;  provided 
also,  that  the  prioritie  of  theire  graunt  shall  not  giue  them  precedency 
of  other  companies  that  may  be  graunted;  but  that  poynt  to  be  deter- 
mined by  this  Court  when  there  shalbe  occasion  thereof;  provided  also, 
that  no  vnlawfuU  combination  be  made  at  any  time  by  the  sd  company 
of  shoomakers  for  inhancinge  the  prices  of  shooes,  boots  or  wages, 
whereby  either  our  owne  people  may  suffer;  provided  also,  that  in  cases 
of  dificultie,  the  sd  officers  &  associats  doe  not  pceede  to  determine  the 
cause  but  by  the  advice  of  the  judges  of  that  county;  provided,  that  no 
shoomaker  shall  refuse  to  make  shooes  for  any  inhabitant,  at  reason- 
able rates,  of  theire  owne  leather,  for  the  vse  of  themselves  &  families, 
only  if  they  be  required  therevnto;  provided,  lastly,  that  if  any  pson 
shall  find  himselfe  greiued  by  such  excessiue  fines  or  other  illegall 
pceedings  of  the  sd  ofl&cers,  he  may  complayne  thereof  at  the  next 
Court  of  that  county,  who  may  heare  &  determine  the  cause.  This 
commission  to  continue  &  be  of  force  for  three  years  &  no  longer, 
vnles  the  Court  shall  see  cause  to  continue  the  same. 

The  same  comissiom,  verbatim,  with  the  same  libtie  &  power  for  the 
same  ends,  vpon  the  like  grounds  is  giuen  unto  Thomas  Venner,  John 
Milium,  Samuel  Bidfeild,  James  Mattocks,  Wm.  Cutler,  Bartholomew 
Barlow,  &  the  rest  of  the  coops  of  Boston  &  Charlestowne^  for  the 


APPENDICES  173 

pventing  abuses  in  theire  trade.  To  continue  only  for  three  yars,  as 
the  former,  mutatis  mutandis.  —  Records  of  the  Colony  of  Massa- 
chusetts Bay  in  New  England,  vol.  iii,  p.  132. 


VII 

Excerpts  from  the  Timothy  White  Papers 

In  a  letter  of  September  15,  1725,  before  Timothy  White  went  to 
Nantucket,  he  asked  his  sister  for  stockings,  saying  "let  them  be  home 
spun,  stone  gray  worsted;  but  if  you  cannot  find  such,  get  me  a  pair  or 
two  of  sale  stockings." 

June      24,  1740    this  Timothy  White  paid  to  Jos.  Daws's  wife  for  weaving 

20/ 
Paid  Maxcy  for  leather  20s. 
Paid  Richard  Coffin  20/  for  leather. 
Paid  Zach.  Hoit  Dr.  to  a  pair  of  shoes  8/  and  i  Bush.  Com 

8/6 
Let  Zach  Hoit  have  10/  and  19  day  a  pair  of  Shoes  at  David 

Clark's  20/, 
Paid  Richard  Coffin  (by  the  Nav'  Officer)  for  the  Sole 

Leather  12/ 
Paid  to  David  Gardner  for  currying  leather  £054 
Paid  to  Maxcy  for  Linings  15/ 
Paid  Ruth  Cromwell  for  wool-cash  £900 
Paid  David  Gardner  for  a  side  of  leather  70s 

The  Timothy  White  papers  ^  show  accounts  with  all  the  natives  of 
Nantucket  for  the  schooling  of  their  children.  Generally  he  was  paid  in 
money,  but  occasionally  in  cheese,  corn,  paper,  fish,  books,  and  rye. 
The  fact  of  his  taking  cheese  and  corn  in  return  for  service  and  paying 
bills  for  the  pasturing  of  his  cow  for  many  years  suggests  that  he  did 
not  have  much  land  to  farm.  Evidently  school  teaching  was  his  main 
occupation,  and  making  shoes  for  himself  and  family  and  neighbors  a 
helpful  resource. 

VIII 

Excerpts  from  the  George  Reed  Papers 

A  picture  of  daily  family  Hfe  and  household  economy  in  this  Home 
Stage  of  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  is  given,  for  example,  in  an  ac- 

•  Included  in  the  Timothy  White  papers  reprinted  by  the  Nantucket  Historical 
Society. 


July       9. 

1740 

July      IS, 

1740 

July      20, 

1740 

August  21 

August 

1740 

April 

1744 

May      25, 

1744 

June      18, 

1744 

May 

1748 

174  APPENDICES 

count  book  of  George  Reed,  of  Dighton,  Massachusetts.  He  wrote  it 
from  1729  to  1763.  Dighton  was  at  least  half  a  century  behind  the 
communities  lying  near  Boston  and  the  Bay  in  her  economic  and  in- 
dustrial development,  so  that  the  Home  Stage  of  industry,  when  the 
community  was  almost  self-sufficing  and  knew  few  markets,  lasted 
until  the  third  quarter  of  the  eighteenth  century.  The  book  itself,  of 
unruled,  unglazed  paper,  with  its  untooled  crinkled  rawhide  cover  is 
suggestive  of  the  home-made  standards  of  this  little  inland  community. 
The  intimate,  personal  tone  of  the  entries  make  for  realism  and  for 
sympathetic  attention. 

Dighton  march  the  21  day  year  1729.     Thomas  Reed 

£    s.  d. 

and  for  one  days  work  and  tow  shillings  more 3    4  o 

and  for  money  lent o     2  o 

and  for  iron  work o  10  o 

and  for  vamps  for  a  pare  of  shoes  and  soles  for  yourself o     3  i 

and  for  3  barels  of  cydear 410  o 

George  Reed. 

Though  a  farmer.  Reed  evidently  did  not  own  oxen,  for  he  repeatedly 
hired  them.  He  owned  a  horse  which  he  "hired  out"  along  with  his 
three  sons,  and  he  made  money  from  his  orchard  and  pasture. 

Dighton,  Oct.  the  17  day  year  1729  Cornelos  Jones. 

£  5.  d. 

to  me  for  apples  which  you  had  in  the  loer  *  orchit o  8  o 

and  for  six  bushels  of  winter  appels o  6  o 

and  for  my  mares  going  to  Tanton  ^ o  2  o 

and  for  my  mares  going  to  Tanton o  2  o 

more  for  my  mare  to  Stephens  Mill o  i  o 

and  for  my  mare  threshing o  2  o 

and  for  my  mares  going  to  Tanton  to  carrey  your  wife o  3  o 

and  for  your  cow  pastorin  2  weeks o  2  o 

and  for  my  mare  going  to  mill  tow  times o  o  9 

Dighton,  novembear  Credar  for  goods  which  I  had  of  you  at  one 

time I  17  8 

at  another  time,  cap,  gloves  and  paper 015  3 

and  for  two  gallens  and  three  quarts  of  rum i  2  o 

and  for  3  pounds  and  a  half  of  sugar o  4  4 

and  for  an  almeneck  which  I  had o  o  6 

and  for  a  peck  of  pegs o  3  9 

1  The  phonetic  spelling  of  the  country  dialect  is  warranted  to  give  atmosphere 
to  these  naive  accounts  even  in  reprint. 

*  Taunton  is  directly  north  of  Dighton,  and  was  then  as  now  the  nearest  town. 
It  was  probably  the  chief  market  for  the  Dighton  farmers.   See  map  on  page  14. 


APPENDICES  175 

In  the  account  for  1730  Reed  appears  not  only  as  a  farmer,  but  also  as  a 

quiet  wit. 

Dighton,  June  13  day  year  1730  Comelus  Jones  debtor  to  me.       £    s.    d. 
for  killing  a  calf  and  for  my  mares  going  to  Stephens  mill  one  time      010 

for  my  mares  going  to  Tanton  to  carry  your  dear  self o     2     o 

for  my  mares  going  to  Abbenton  to  carry  your  dear  self o     6     o 

for  my  mares  going  to  Willbor  Daniel  to  by  bef ,  sir,  if  you  please  ..020 

for  your  pigs  eating  my  corn,  year  1730  you  agreed o    8    o 

for  my  feching  and  caring  granne  hataway o     2     o 

For  his  son's  work  he  got  the  following  pay: 

July  6  day  year  1742.     Daniel  Whitman  debtor.  £    s.  d. 

to  George  helping  cut  stoks  one  day  which  was  forgot o     2  o 

to  George  going  to  mill 017  ° 

to  half  a  days  work  about  the  Conor o    4  o 

to  one  day  of  Johns  Carting  dung o     8  o 

to  Johns  helping  you  §  day  about  hey o     4  o 

to  George  helping  you  on  crib  corn o     3  o 

to  pastorin  your  oxen o     2  o 

to  Johnes  helping  you  2 1  days 4    o  o 

At  the  same  time,  Daniel  Whitman  was  keeping  track  of  his  indebted- 
ness to  this  George  Reed. 

£   s.  d. 

Credate  to  your  o.xen  to  draw  my  hay  to  gather o     3  o 

to  carting  one  day  with  one  yoke  of  oxen 016  o 

to  your  oxen  one  day o  10  o 

to  your  helping  me  plow o     8  o 

to  your  drawing  one  lode  of  wood o    6  o 

Within  the  household,  Mrs.  Reed  evidently  gave  some  help  in  bringing 
in  ready  money,  for  in  1740,  George  Reed  was  charging  to  Dabora 

Talbot 

£.    5    d. 

to  eggs  and  thread  and  worsted  and  milk o    9  8 

to  coming  4  pounds  of  wostord  ^ 012  o 

to  coming  25  pounds  of  wostord o     6  o 

to  weaving  2  yards  of  cloath o     4  i 

to  coming  2  J  of  wostord 

for  half  a  bushel  of  (?)  at  £1  155.  od.  a  bushel 017  6 

for  Qj-  qts.  of  milk o     9  6 

In  the  Reed's  kitchen,  wool  combing  and  weaving  was  done  for  the 
family  and  occasionally  a  neighbor,  and  the  winter's  supply  of  boots 
and  shoes  was  evidently  made  up  by  the  father  and  sons,  for  aside  from 

'  Combing  worsted. 


1 76  APPENDICES 

the  record  of  selling  pegs  and  vamps  there  is  no  mention  of  buying 
either  shoes  or  materials  for  them  in  all  those  pages  covering  the  years 
1729  to  1 763.^  All  the  other  items  are  those  which  naturally  accompany 
living  in  the  Home  Stage.^ 


IX 

Some  Typical  Details  of  the  Early  Political,  Religious, 
AND  Financial  History  of  Four  Massachusetts  Shoe 

Centres 

Randolph  {Cochato) 

Before  17 15,  there  were  settlers  in  the  Cochato  River  valley  of  Old 
Braintree  provided  with  log  cabins  and  at  least  one  saw  mill,  and  by 
March,  1727,  the  South  Precinct  was  setoff  from  Braintree.  Their 
petition  to  the  General  Court  for  such  a  distinct  incorporation,  dated 
December  28,  1727, 

Humbly  Sheweth  That  your  Petitioners,  and  others  of  our  Neighbors  who 
joyn  with  us,  are  laboring  under  difficult,  and  distressing  circumstances,  in 
regard  to  the  remoteness  of  our  Habitations  from  the  Publick  worship  of 
God  for  several  of  us  dweU  at  Such  a  distance  therefrom,  that  we,  with  our 
families  are  forced  to  travaille  upon  the  Sabbath  five  miles,  Some  Six,  Some 
Seven  miles  to  a  Meeting  to  hear  the  word  preached,  upon  such  considera- 
tion, That  it  might  be  less  labour  and  more  easie  for  us,  we  have  been  at  a 
charge  to  Erect  a  Convenient  House,  and  have  set  it  in  such  a  Suitable  place 
(tho.  not^-  yet  finished)  as  may  very  well  accomodate  the  Neighborhood  for 
Such  a  service.  Also,  we  have  chosen  persons  to  seek  a  Suitable  Minister 
to  preach  with  us  this  Winter,  this  was  done  with  the  Advice  and  consent 
of  our  present  minister  Mr.  Niles  who  has  promised  his  assistance  in  this 
good  work. 

The  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  and  the  town  of  Braintree 
granted  this  request  to  the  pioneers  of  Cochato,  and  they  were  free  to 
take  up  their  social  and  religious  independence.  The  political^  de- 
pendence was  acknowledged  in  the  terms  "South  Precinct  of  Brain- 
tree" and  the  name  Cochato  was  dropped  in  aU  official  records. 

'  This  account  book  is  owned  by  Miss  Julia  Gilmore  of  North  Raynham,  Mass. 

2  Biicher,  etc.  .  .  .,  p.  89  of  Wickett's  trans. 

^  Precinct  and  town  are  distinct  in  their  nature,  object  and  powers.  While  the 
former  is  established  solely  for  the  purpose  of  maintaining  public  worship,  its 
powers  being  limited  to  that  effect,  the  latter,  a  civil  and  political  corporation, 
is  established  for  municipal  purposes. 


I 

0 

I 

0  0 


APPENDICES  177 

For  this  village  and  parish  of  "forty  famihes  and  over  200  souls," 
a  settled  minister  was  secured  with  a  "gift  of  £150  in  money  for  settle- 
ment" and  "£70  a  year  in  money  or  Bills  of  Credit  as  Silver  money  at 
eighteen  shillings  an  ounce."  The  young  parish  did  not  hesitate  to 
assume  large  financial  responsibilities,  nor  the  new  minister,  Mr.  Eaton, 
to  accept  a  hard  parish.  From  the  meeting  house  on  the  "Hill "  in  the 
Precinct  ^  Land,  there  led  paths  in  various  directions  to  the  log  cabins 
as  scattered  as  the  springs  by  which  the  settlers  knew  they  must  locate 
their  farms.  No  fear  of  Indians  influenced  their  action,  or  called  for  a 
village  huddled  about  a  central  stockade.  The  accompanying  map 
shows  how  scattered  these  farms  were  and  makes  one  realize  the  diffi- 
culties of  a  village  parson  and  the  village  doctor.  "To  many  a  cabin  he 
must  find  his  way  by  uncertain  footpaths  and  trees  marked  by  the 
axe."  2  From  the  Hunt  farm  to  the  French  homestead  was  a  distance 
of  at  least  two  miles  in  an  air  line. 

The  bridle  path  over  which  Samuel  Sewall  and  Colonel  Hawthorne 
traveled  in  1704^  on  the  way  from  Boston  to  Taunton,  "baiting"  at 
Braintree  and  at  Bridgewater  had  been  given  a  formal  location  by 
1 7 14,  and  though  it  was  still  known  as  the  "Old  Beaten  Path,"  its 
conventional  name  was  hereafter  the  Bridgewater  Road.  From  Brain- 
tree  records,  we  can  see  how  eagerly  the  young  parish  clamored  for 
more  roads  to  be  built.  It  was  not  merely  for  the  sake  of  easier  travel- 
ing for  the  parson  or  any  stranger's  carriage,''  but  for  the  convenience 
of  carts  laden  with  farm  produce,  and  lumber  drawn  by  oxen,  that 
roads  were  wanted  by  this  young  farming  community.^ 

'  "  The  central  hill  where  the  church  and  the  schoolhouse  were  located,  was 
known  as  the  '  Precinct  Land.'  "  Records  show  that  Joseph  Crosby,  who  lived  in  the 
North  Precinct  of  Braintree  gave  to  the  South  precinct  for  a  consideration  of  forty 
shillings,  a  certain  parcel  of  land  in  Braintree,  in  the  County  of  SuEfolk,  in  the 
Province  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  containing  one  acre  more  or  less,  situated  on  a 
country  road  leading  to  Bridgewater  and  set  off  by  certain  heaps  of  stones  at  the 
four  corners  thereof.  This  deed  was  dated  March  i,  1727-28,  and  is  entered  with 
Suffolk  Records,  August  23,  1757,  Lib.  90,  p.  200. 

*  Cf.  Discourse  of  Reverend  John  C.  Labaree  in  Proceedings  of  the  One  Hun- 
dred Fiftieth  Anniversary  of  the  ist  Congregational  Church  of  Randolph. 

'  Cf.  The  Diary  of  Samuel  Sewall,  vol.  ii,  p.  115. 

*  "  It  is  related  that  for  thirty  years  after  the  first  meeting  house  was  built,  it  was 
not  approached  by  carriage."  Cf.  Benjamin  Dickerman's  Discourse  in  Proceed- 
ings, p.  65. 

*  Here  is  where  the  English  colonists  in  America  felt  the  lack  of  the  old  feudal 
organization  which  had  furnished  roads  for  England,  or  the  later  leadership  of 
intelligent  landlords  with  the  means  to  suggest  the  way  and  bear  the  financial 


178  APPENDICES 

After  17  2 1  they  sometimes  took  the  cartway  to  Dorchester,  going 
through  what  is  now  known  as  Canton.  South  Street,  leading  east  from 
the  Hill  to  Wessagusset  (Weymouth)  and  to  Abington,  was  located  as 
early  as  173 1.  Saddleback  traffic  might  do  for  surplus  supplies  of  yarn, 
linen,  and  woolen  cloth  but  it  would  not  do  for  lumber  and  vegetables. 
There  must  have  been  trade  in  surplus  products,  for  otherwise,  the 
product  of  the  work  of  the  men  on  the  farms,  and  of  women  in  the  farm 
houses  could  not  have  been  supplemented.  How  else  could  the  par- 
ishioners raise  the  salary  of  the  minister,  and  pay  for  the  furnishings  of 
the  meeting  house  ?  No  mortgage  was  ever  put  on  any  of  the  meet- 
ing houses  set  on  the  Hill,  and  no  minister  lost  any  of  his  salary. 
Then,  besides  supporting  the  Church,  the  South  Precinct  of  Brain  tree 
had  to  pay  its  share  of  its  mother  town's  public  rates.  It  is  by  reading 
thus  between  the  lines  of  the  civil  and  parish  records  of  the  time  that 
we  get  the  economic  history  of  the  early  New  England  towns.  It  is 
here  also  that  we  get  our  gUmpse  of  the  social  and  industrial  life  in  the 
South  Precinct  of  Braintree.  Nothing  is  said  of  the  clothes,  warm 
coats,  and  rude  shoes  made  in  the  kitchens  at  Cochato  by  the  farmers' 
wives  and  the  farmers  themselves,  but  tradition  supplies  these  details 
and  adds  that  even  in  cold  weather,  the  shoes  were  carried  and  not 
worn  to  church.  It  was  only  at  a  few  rods  distance  from  the  Church 
door  that  the  shoes  were  put  on.^  Not  by  all  the  Church-goers  even 
then,  for  disturbance  from  the  "barefoot  boy"  in  the  gallery  was  no 
uncommon  feature  of  the  Sabbath  service.  Such  stories  come  to  us  by 
tradition  along  with  others  about  men  wearing  frocks  of  blue  homespun 
to  meeting. 

brunt  in  the  rural  community.  This  little  settlement  could  only  look  to  the  state,  i.e., 
to  political  organization  to  supply  them  with  economic  necessities  of  a  communal 
character.  Yet  the  town,  when  its  ear  was  once  secured  and  its  mind  convinced, 
did  its  part.  Cf .  T.  N.  Carver,  in  the  Yearbook  of  the  Department  of  Agriculture 
for  1914,  on  the  Organization  of  Rural  Interests,  pp.  240-400. 

1  Mr.  Dow  Barnes  of  Frenchtown,  Pa.,  remembers  distinctly  how  his  Aunt 
Harriet  came  to  their  house  each  Sunday  inorning  on  her  way  from  "  Grandfather's 
Hill  Farmhouse  "  to  the  meeting  house,  and  stopped  at  his  home  to  put  on  the  shoes 
which  she  had  carried  so  far  in  her  hands.  This  memory  concerns  the  years  1858 
to  1863  in  an  isolated  community  where  all  shoes  worn  were  made  to  order  and 
treated  with  the  same  sparing  care  that  the  people  of  Randolph  were  giving  to  theirs 
a  whole  century  and  a  half  earlier.  This  seems  like  an  interesting  bit  of  evidence 
that  economic  conditions  bring  certain  habits  of  thrift  or  the  reverse.  What  man 
among  us  conscientiously  or  consciously  saved  his  three  dollar  and  a  half  machine- 
made  shoes  made  before  the  World  War  even  if  he  did  tell  his  live-year-old  son  to 
look  out  for  the  toes  of  his  ? 


APPENDICES  1 79 

The  written  records  of  the  parish  tell  us  details  about  the  first,  and 
then  the  second,  meeting  house.  From  the  crudeness  of  this  "best 
house"  we  may  judge  of  the  houses  of  the  parishoners.  Built  two 
stories  high,  44  X32  feet,  the  meeting  house  was  a  plank  building  with  a 
pitch  roof,  shingled  and  clapboarded,  and  had  a  double  door  for  enter- 
ing at  the  south.  The  broad  aisle  led  from  this  door  to  the  pulpit  and 
seats  to  the  right  were  occupied  by  men,  and  those  to  the  left  by 
women.  Although  the  walls  were  lathed  and  plastered,  there  was  not  a 
bit  of  paint  put  on  the  inside  or  outside.  The  lumber  had  been  sawed  at 
Paine's  Mill,  down  by  Glover's  Brook  (see  map),  and  had  been  put 
together  by  men  of  the  parish  according  to  the  custom  of  all  these  early 
towns.^ 

If  people  then,  in  this  frontier  town,  had  to  make  their  own  share  of 
the  meeting  house  and  their  pews,  it  is  but  a  natural  part  of  the  same 
economy  that  they  made  their  own  boots  and  shoes.  Even  when  a  man 
worked  outside  of  his  own  farm  for  wages,  the  amount  of  ready  money 
was  small.  Ten  shillings  was  the  pay  for  janitor  service  at  the  Church 
for  the  whole  year  of  1735.  Twenty  years  later  Seth  Turner  was  paid 
only  six  pistareens^  for  a  year's  care  of  the  meeting  house,  on  the  con- 
dition that  he  should  sweep  it  twelve  times,  yet  these  Spanish  coins 
were  probably  a  large  part  of  the  ready  money  he  had  that  year. 

About  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  houses  at  the  South 
Precinct  were  made  more  comfortable  and  looked  less  crude.  Then 
some  people  thought  that  the  community  should  see  to  it  that  the 
Lord's  house  should  be  made  better.  It  took  some  years  of  discussion 
to  make  all  the  people  ready  for  the  new  meeting  house,  or  the  cost  it 
would  entail.  Perhaps  the  refusal  to  repair  the  old  meeting  house  was 
the  diplomatic  move  of  a  few  leaders  to  procure  an  entirely  new  one. 
And  so  rain  and  snow  found  their  way  regularly  into  the  church  and 
yet  the  parish  failed  to  vote  for  lime  to  join  the  gable  into  the  meeting 
house  and  get  two  bundles  of  shingles  and  one  hundred  clapboards  for 
repairs,  in  1758.' 

New  settlers  and  increased  wealth  had  evidently  come  to  the  village 

1  See  town  records  of  South  Dennis,  Dudley,  Nantucket,  North  Bridgewater  and 
Brookfield  for  similar  proceedings  and  conditions.  One  vote  of  the  Randolph  parish 
reads  that  "  John  French  is  to  build  the  floor  in  the  galler>'  and  the  stairs  leading 
to  it,  to  lathe  and  plaster  said  gallery  up  to  the  beams,  and  for  this  work  he  is  to 
have  a  pew  in  the  gallery  7  feet  long  and  4  feet  10  inches  in  depth." 

2  In  the  Breed  Papers  quoted  in  .Xppcndix  XI,  in  the  Daniel  Parrott  account, 
it  might  appear  that  a  pistarecn  was  equivalent  to  nine  shillings  in  1772. 

'  Discussion  by  Benjamin  Dickerman  in  Proceedings  .  .  .  Randolph,  p.  65. 


l8o  APPENDICES 

by  1762,  for,  on  January  14th,  when  all  the  freeholders  and  other  in- 
habitants of  the  South  Precinct  were  warned  to  meet  at  their  meeting 
house  at  ten  o'clock  in  the  forenoon,  it  was  there  voted  to  build  a  new 
meeting  house.  The  records  of  this  new  church  show  the  fuller  purses 
and  the  higher  standards  of  the  parish.  Two  hundred  pounds  were  to 
be  raised  according  to  the  vote  towards  building  this  meeting  house 
and  it  was  to  be  underpinned  on  the  front  and  ends  with  two  tiers  of 
cut  stone.  The  parish  also  voted  to  build  a  steeple  fifty  feet  high  to  the 
bell  deck  and  forty-six  feet  above  that  to  the  tip  of  the  spire.  The  sills 
were  of  white  oak,  and  cedar  shingles,  and  cedar  clapboards  only  were 
to  be  used.  A  sounding  board  was  to  be  placed  over  the  pulpit,  and 
wide  galleries  were  built  on  three  sides.  Evidently  there  was  a  chance 
for  greater  income  from  the  Church-goers  for  the  average  price  for  a 
pew  was  about  fifteen  pounds,  although  they  varied  according  to 
desirable  location,  from  six  to  twenty  pounds.  The  amount  of  ready 
money  in  the  community  can  be  judged  by  these  figures.  The  cost  of 
the  new  meeting  house  material  amounted  to  little  over  £987.  The 
money  raised  from  the  sale  of  pews,  of  the  old  meeting  house  and  old 
school  house,  and  that  raised  by  the  precinct  and  by  church  members 
from  the  neighboring  town  of  Stoughton,  had  provided  a  total  fund  of 
£1012/8,  so  that  the  new  meeting  house  started  out  unencumbered  by 
debt  and  there  was  a  balance  in  the  treasury  of  £25/1/10.  It  was  voted 
to  sweep  the  meeting  house  oftener,  to  ring  the  curfew  at  nine  o'clock 
each  evening,  and  to  toll  the  bell  for  the  death  of  any  parishioner  or 
any  member  of  the  Precinct.  Thus  Randolph  had  come  to  division  of 
labor  and  had  already  passed  from  the  Home  Stage  of  production 
and  payment  in  kind  into  the  Handicraft  Period.  In  some  industries, 
she  was  entering  the  Domestic  Period,  which  would  give  more  ready 
money  to  producers  and  lead  to  even  greater  division  of  labor, 

Brockton  {North  Bridgewater) 

The  details  of  North  Bridgewater's  early  history  also  include  facts 
from  the  parish  records  which  give  an  insight  into  their  economic  con- 
ditions in  turn.  By  1737,  this  village  was  ready  to  build  a  meeting 
house,  to  support  a  minister,  and  to  control  its  own  parish  affairs.  In 
the  town  meeting  of  1739,  Timothy  Keith  and  Benjamin  Edson  were 
chosen  a  committee  for  the  finishing  of  the  meeting  house  in  said 
precinct.   It  chose  Abiel  Packard  "Recever  of  Stuf  and  meterrels." ' 

^  Documents  quoted  in  Bradford  Kingman's  History  of  North  Bridgewater, 
pp.  20-2S,  85-95. 


APPENDICES  l8l 

By  further  agreement,  James  Packard  was  to  do  the  glazing  of  the 
house,  and  "what  it  amounts  to  more  than  his  Reats  {i.e.,  taxes)  Come 
to,  to  take  his  pay  at  the  forge,  in  Iron  Ore  or  Cole  next  fall."  John 
Johnson  and  John  Kingman  were  to  do  the  mason  work,  and  provide 
the  nails. 

This  North  Bridgewater  parish  paid  a  bonus  of  £300  for  the  settle- 
ment of  the  minister,  and  agreed  to  pay  the  Reverend  John  Porter  one 
hundred  eighty  pounds  yearly  in  any  passable  money;  his  salary  was 
to  rise  and  fall  as  the  price  of  silver  did  during  the  time  that  he  should 
be  the  minister.  By  1762,  the  parish  had  raised  money  enough  for  a  new 
meeting  house  which  had  a  belfry  and  a  bell.  Twenty-six  years  later, 
a  parish  committee  reported  as  necessary  repairs  the  following:  "new 
sett  the  Glass  in  putty,  paint  the  Door,  windows,  and  walls,  and  the 
platform  of  the  Belfree  to  be  covered  with  led."  This  is  our  best  evi- 
dences that  the  parish  was  growing  richer.  They  had  a  comparatively 
rich  and  varied  soil  to  depend  upon  as  farmers.  There  were  several 
brooks  and  a  pond  fed  by  a  stream  sufficiently  deep  to  provide  water 
power  for  their  saw  mills  and  grist '  mills. 

Brookfield  {Quahaug) 

Stretching  out  over  the  Massachusetts  lands  from  Boston  towards 
the  south  were  the  settlements  made  at  Braintree  (1625),^  Bridge- 
water  (1639),  Taunton  (1637),  and  Plymouth  (1620);  towards  the 
west  were  Concord  (1635),  Lancaster  (1643),  Sudbury  (1635)  and 
Springfield  (1636).  Between  these  groups  of  settlements  there  was  a 
wilderness  marked  by  more  or  less  well  defined  Indian  trails,  and  two 
English  bridle  paths  which  followed  the  divides  and  crossed  the  streams 
at  natural  fordways.  Even  before  the  Reverend  Thomas  Hooker 
started  with  his  Cambridge  (Newtown)  congregation  for  the  new  lands 
to  the  west,  in  1636,  there  was  a  definite  trail  towards  the  Connecticut 
River  Valley  known  as  the  old  Connecticut  Path. 

Brookfield  as  a  frontier  settlement  had  to  repeat  pioneer  conditions. 
This  meant  for  its  settlers  a  return  to  the  Home  Period  of  production 
and  hard  economic  struggles  besides  those  with  the  Indians. 

'  Several  men  over  fifty  years  of  age  living  in  Brockton  have  told  me  of  going  up 
Elm  Street  with  corn  to  be  ground  at  the  old  grist  mill  in  their  boyhood,  and  of 
their  duty  of  watching  the  toll  being  taken  out  in  kind.  Now  several  factories 
stand  on  the  grist  mill  site  and  the  water  is  colored  and  scented  with  shoe  paste. 

'  Cf.  Records  of  the  Massachusetts  General  Court;  and  Temple:  History  of 
North  Brookfield  for  reprints  of  interesting  source  material  and  bibliography. 


1 82  APPENDICES 

By  1660  white  men  from  Ipswich  were  ready  to  take  from  the 
Indians  this  spot  where  the  trails  crossed,  even  if  it  were  in  the  wilder- 
ness, provided  they  could  get  the  consent  of  the  General  Court  of 
Massachusetts.  That  was  given,  conditionally,  in  May  of  the  same 
year  in  the  terms  of  "six  square  miles  near  Quabaug  Ponds"  on  con- 
dition of  twenty  families  being  resident  there  within  three  years  and  an 
able  minister  settled  there  within  the  said  town.  Indian  troubles  seem 
to  have  delayed  such  settlement  until  1665,  when  neighboring  grants 
gave  rise  to  a  fear  of  loss  of  claims.  In  desperation  a  few  men  put  up 
houses  and  an  actual  settlement  was  begun.  Needing  a  title  from  In- 
dian owners,  th,ese  settlers  asked  Lieutenant  Cooper,  of  Springfield,  to 
negotiate  it.  They  collected  three  hundred  fathoms  of  wampum, 
equal  to  seventy-five  pounds  in  money,  from  the  six  or  seven  families 
there,  and  tried  to  get  a  new  grant  from  the  General  Court  of  Massa- 
chusetts in  1667.  Their  remissness  was  reviewed,  rebuked  and  for- 
given by  that  body,  and  a  regrant  was  made  on  similar  conditions. 
The  town  had  a  hard  time  of  it  even  after  this,  for  all  through  the  In- 
dian Wars  they  were  in  trouble,  loss,  and  terror  from  fire  and  tumult 
until  at  last,  the  whole  village  was  wiped  out  in  1676.  It  was  born 
again  in  1686  and  had  its  youth  and  early  manhood  before  1783.^ 

Lynn  (Saugus) 

Lynn  was  the  oldest  of  the  four  shoe  centres  studied  here  in  detail. 
Its  early  economic  history  can  be  gleaned,  like  that  of  the  other  three, 
only  from  stray  sentences  in  the  records  concerned  primarily  with  its 
political  and  parish  life. 

Founded  in  1629  under  the  name  of  Saugus,  by  Edmund  Ingalls,  a 
farmer  from  Lincobishire,  England,  it  was  intended  for  a  farming  com- 
munity. The  grants  from  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  were 
generous  in  good  lands  near  the  Bay.  Yet  from  the  very  first,  the  sea 
offered  a  rival  to  farming  as  an  industry,  in  the  way  of  fishing,  and 
Francis  Ingalls,  brother  of  the  founder,  offered  still  another  rival  as 
early  as  1630.  Having  been  a  tanner  in  England,  he  at  once  built  a 
tannery  at  Humpfrey's  Brook,  in  the  part  of  Old  Lynn  now  known  as 
Swampscott.  There  the  vats  remained  until  1823,  to  tell  this  fact  if 
by  chance  the  old  men  had  forgotten  the  tradition  of  the  first  tannery 
in  New  England. 

*  These  dates  are  for  the  first  settlements  and  not  for  the  incorporation  of  the 
towns. 


APPENDICES  183 

The  list  of  original  settlers  and  landholders  includes  forty  names. ^ 
Three  were  spoken  of  as  captains,  and  another  as  lieutenant.  They  are 
recorded  as  having,  as  a  community,  herds  and  flocks  of  horned  cattle, 
sheep  and  swine.  From  them  they  got  not  only  their  meat,  tallow, 
butter  and  cheese,  but  wool  and  hides  as  well.  From  the  earliest  days 
they  raised  quantities  of  flax  and  rotted  it  in  a  pond  which  still  has  the 
name  of  Flax  Pond. 

With  the  coming  of  a  clergyman,  the  Reverend  Mr.  Whiting  of 
King's  Lynn,  England,  there  came  a  change  of  name  for  the  Saugus 
settlement,  the  settlers  taking  the  new  name  either  to  please  him  or  to 
make  him  feel  at  home.  When  Edward  Johnson's  Wonder  Working 
Providence  was  pubhshed  in  1654,  Lynn  people  found  their  town  had 
been  definitely  described  by  him: 

.  .  .  her  scituation  is  neere  to  a  River,  whose  strong  freshet  at  breaking 
up  of  Winter,  filleth  all  her  Bankes,  and  with  a  furious  Torrent  ventes  itselfe 
into  the  Sea.  This  Towne  is  furnished  with  Mineralls  of  divers  kinds, 
especially  Iron  and  Lead.  The  forme  of  it  is  almost  square,  onely  it  takes  too 
large  a  run  in  Landward  (as  most  townes  do.)  It  is  filled  with  about  one 
Hundred  Houses  for  dwelling.  Here  is  also  an  Iron  Mill  in  constant  use,  .  .  . 
Their  meeting-house  being  on  a  levell  Land  undefended  from  the  cold  North 
west-wind;  .  .  .  their  streetes  are  straite  and  comly,  Yet  but  thin  of  Houses. 
The  people  mostly  inclining  to  Husbandry,  have  built  many  Farmes  Re- 
mote there,  cattell  exceedingly  multiplied.  .  .  .  Horse,  Kine  and  Sheep  are 
most  in  request  with  them."   Bk.  I,  ch.  22. 


X 

Excerpts  from  the  Southworth  Papers 

Even  as  late  as  1811,  conditions  Uke  those  of  Revolutionary  days 
survived  in  shoemaking  as  a  by-industry.  Jedediah  Southworth  lived 
in  West  Stoughton  about  a  mile  from  Stoughton  Centre,  on  land  that 
was  set  off  originally  to  Capt.  Consider  Atherton.'^  He  was  a  farmer 
who  had  cattle  and  horses  to  rent,  and  made  as  well  as  repaired  shoes 
as  a  side  occupation,  using  hides  taken  from  his  own  cattle.  His  sons 
Luther  and  Apwllos  were  "let  out"  along  with  his  cattle, 

*  This,  and  many  other  interesting  details  of  Lynn's  early  history,  can  be  found 
in  the  official  records  of  Lynn,  and  of  the  Massachusetts  General  Court.  Cf.  Lewis 
and  Newhall:  History  of  Lynn,  for  reprints  of  original  sources  and  for  bibliography. 

*  His  great  grandson,  Loren  Pufler,  of  Brockton,  has  the  Southworth  account 
books  in  his  possession. 


184  APPENDICES 

Lewis  Johnson'  to  J.  Southworth,  Dr. 
1811 

May  16  to  Plowen  one  Day  with  three  Cattle    $2.00 

18  to  Plowen  one  Day              "         "        2.00 

21  to        "         "         "               "         "        2.00 

June  21  to  Apollos  one  Day  Hoeing 0.67 

July    6  to  Carten  a  L**  of  Vinegar  to  Boston  4.00 

16    to  Carten  five  Barrel  of  Vinegar  to  B 2.36 

Aug.    3    to  Carten  a  L"*  of  Hay  from  F.  M.*   2.00 

5      "       "  "  "         "  "      2.00 

7      "       "  "  "         "  "      2.00 

17"       "  L**  of  Vinegar  to  Boston 4.00 

Lewis  Johnson  to  J.  Southworth,  Dr. 

1812 

May    9    to  Carten  to  Bos°  5  bbls.  of  Vinegar,  5  doz.  of  Shovels  one  Set  of 

wheels    $3.60 

to  Carten  up  4  Bushels  of  Com  and  meat 33 

to  Sundry  articles  Brought  up 17 

June  13    to  Carten  4  lb.  of  Vinegar,  12  Doz  of  Shovels  to  Boston 3.60 

to  Carten  up  Ten  Bushels  of  Grain   0.53 

to       "       4  barrels    0.33 

to       "       Herring  flour  molas  and  Sundry  other  articles 40 

L*.  Hez''.  Byay  to  J.  Southworth,  Dr. 
1812 

Feby  11     to  drawen  Seven  Load  of  wood  to  W.  Richmond   $5-33 

Apr.  to  drawen  four  Load  of  rails  from  E.  Swamp 3.00 

1813 

Feby.        to  four  Days  &  half  work  Luther  &  Team  6.75 

to  horse  to  Easton  meeting   0.25 

Mar.  10    to  Carten  up  15  1/3  of  Salt  Hay   2.00 

to  15  1/3  of  Salt  hay  hundreds 7.87 

Nov.    9    to  three  hhds  of  Lime 7.0x3 

to  horses  to  Mr.  Holmes    20 

22  to  37  cwt.  of  Salt  Hay  &  Carten  at  fifty  cents 16.50 

to  Paying  for  weighing 55 

to  one  Dollar  on  Moses  Byay i  .00 


50.45 
1814    Mar.  II     Settled 

^  Johnson  —  a  farmer  who  made  shovels. 

2  F.  M.  —  Fowl  Meadow,  between  Canton  and  Milton,  right  opposite  Ponka- 
poag  Pond.     (See  Randolph  Map,  p.  176.) 


APPENDICES  185 

Contra  to  Hez.""  Byay 
1812 

Reed  14  i/i  feet  of  Walnut  wood    S4.7S 

Reed  7  feet  of  Chestnut  Bark 1.7s 

Nov.    6    Reed  6  feet  of  wood  Standing  on  y^  Plain 1.50 

22    Reed  6  feet  of  wood  on  y«  T.  Pike  ' 1.88 

27     Reed  6  feet  wood  on  y*  Plain   1.88 

(ete.  amounting  to  21.25) 21.25 

1814 

Mar.  13    To  Sawen  &  Slabs  &  S 33oi 

Settled  by  balance 17-44 

50-45 
James  Sotth,  Jr.  to  J.  Southworth,  Dr. 

1814 

Taken  from  Page  4 ^4-75 

Aug.*  27    to  Jaeket  for  Benj  Clap 1.75 

27     to  two  Jacket  Patems 3.00 

Sept.  13    to  Tapen  Nathans  Shoes  0.50 

Oct.  30    to  Eleven  hh<i  of  Salt  Hay 8.05 

Dec.  13    to  Tapen  Nathuns  Shoes  and  mending 67 

181S 

Jan.     6    to  a  Pair  of  Shoes  for  Isaac  Smith 1.83 

18    to  Tapen  and  Heel  Tapen  Nathan  Shoes  0.75 

25  to  a  Pair  of  Shoes  for  Ben  Clap   2.00 

Mar.  29    to  Tapen  and  Heel  tapen  Benj.  Clap's  shoes  0.75 

Sept.  26    to  mending  Nathan  Dickeman's  shoes 0.25 

Oct.    23    to  Carten  up  ^\  of  Salt  Hay 1.45 

XI 

Excerpts  from  the  Breed  Papers 

An  account  with  Jeremiah  Gray  in  1768-69  would  suggest  that  he 
was  a  journe3Tnan  v/hom  Amos  Breed  sometimes  paid  by  orders  on 
other  stores:  — 

June  Ye  9,  1768 

Jeremiah  Gray  to  Amos  Breed  Dr.                         n  . 

June    9    To  2  cakes  of  Sope o  9    o 

26  To  a  order  at  Zepaniah  Breeds    i  i     o 

To  I  yard  of  eloath   i  4    o 

July     9    To  I  pr.  of  shoes  for  self 215     o 

To  a  order  at  Zephaniah  Breeds   o  8    o 

1769 

Mar.  29    To  3  copers  worth  of  thread i     3 

'  T.  Pike  —  Taunton  Turnpike. 


1 86  APPENDICES 

Another  account,  mainly  about  food  and  sole  leather,  was  Daniel 
Parrott's.  He  was  an  independent  shoemaker,  evidently,  from  the 
supplies  which  he  bought,  and  not  a  journeyman  Uke  the  previous 
Gray.  The  account  began  in  1771. 

£   s.  d. 

Nov.  u     To  9  pound  of  Beaff 014  3 

"   prunes  and  Shougar  at  Zephaniahs i     i  6 

"    I  pr.  of  vamps o     2  6 

23      "    I  pr.  of  vamps o  i6  o 

«  Nife 030 

1772 

Jan.     6      "   cash  paid,  i  pistoreen   o    9  o 

"   sole  leather    o    9  o 

"   Prunes  at  Zephaniahs o     6  o 

Feb.  28      "   cash  paid  for  meal  017  o 

"   cash  paid  for  fish   o    9  o 

Sept.  10,  1772.    To  cash  paid  in  full    55     2  3 

(Signed)  Daniel  Parrott. 

For  the  volume  of  Amos  Breed's  business  at  its  greatest  extent,  we 
have  such  typical  accounts  as  those  of  Ramsdell,  Estes  and  Chase. 

Cr.  to  Marshack  Ramsdel. 
1768  £   s.    d. 

Feb.     7     By    2  pr.^  of  Callam^  Shoes i     6    o 

"  S  "  "  "  "  3     S  o 

20      «  8  "  "  «  "  5    4  o 

27      "  6  "  «  «  "  3     8  o 

Mar.    5      «  7  «  "  «  «  4  II  o 

12      «      5  "    "        "  "       3     S    o 

19  "     6  "    «        «  "       318    o 

25      "      6  "    «         "  «       318    o 

Apr.  10      «    13  "    «        "  «       8  9  o 

May  14    Marshack  went  home  to  Bord  ^ 

20  By    5  pr.  of  stuff  shoes  ©12/ 3  o  o 

By    5  pr.  of  stuff  shoes 3  o  o 

"      7  "   "      "        "      4    4    o 

"      4  "    "     "        "      2     8     o 

'  This  price  was  probably  not  for  the  shoes  themselves,  as  the  entry  would  in- 
dicate, but  just  for  making  the  shoes,  or  else  the  shoe  stock  and  work  are  both 
included  and  a  low  wholesale  price  much  below  that  given  for  Breed's  custom 
work. 

*  Calimanco,  i.  e.,  calico. 

'  This  would  suggest  that  Ramsdell  was  a  journeyman,  boarding  at  Breed's 
until  May  14,  1768.  That  would  give  weight  to  the  belief  that  the  pay  was  for 
work  only  and  not  for  stock. 


APPENDICES  187 

Cr.  to  Wm.  Estes 

1771  £   ^-  d. 
Nov.  II     By  6  pr.  of  stuff  shoes  @  1 1/3 3     7  5 

16      "    3  "    "      "        "        I  13  9 

23      «    5«    «      «        «      216  3 

30      "    3  "    "      "        "      I  13  9 

Dec.     7      "    3  "    "      "        "      I  13  9 

14      «    3  "    «      «        «      I  13  9 

21      "    5  «    «      "        «      216  3 

28      "    3  "    "      "        "      I  13  9 

The  following  year,  Benjamin  Church  was  making  more  pau-s  at  a 
time  and  bringing  them  in,  as  Estes  had,  about  once  a  week. 

X']J2                                                                                                                                                                                *    ^"  ^' 

Oct.   31     By  5  pr.  of  Stuff  shoes  @  11/   2  15  o 

Nov.    7      "    4"    "    "        "      o    o  o 

Nov.  21     By  2  pr.  of  Stuff  Shoes   o    o  o 

28      "    7  "    "      "        "      o    o  o 

Dec.    s      "    5  "    "     "        "      

12      "    6"    "      "        "      o    o  o 

19      «    8  "    "      "        "      o    o  o 

26      "    9  "    "      "        "      o    o  o 

June    2      "    7"    "      "        "      o    o  o 

1773 

7      «    4  «    «      "        "      o    o  o 

16      "    4  "    "      "        "      o    o  o 

23      «    7  "    «      «        «      o    o  o 

These  amount  to 77    o  o 

The  contra  account  of  Chase  shows  him  buying  shoemaker's  tools  and 

paying  board. 

Benjamin  Chase  to  Amos  Breed,  Dr. 

1772  £  5-  d. 
Oct.   26    To  I  pr.  of  pinchers  and  Nife on  3 

"    I  doz.  of  alls  o    4  o 

Dec.  27      "2  pr.  of  Stuff o  17  6 

1773 

Feb.     2      "    I  "    "   shoes i  10  o 

"    I  doz.  of  Buttons  and  Nife 6  4 

Mar.    6      "    i  silk  handkerchief i   12  o 

Apr.     I      "2  3/4  yds.  velvit  for  jacket    617  6 

19      "   Stuffs  for  I  pr.  of  shoes o  16  o 

"    24  weeks  bord  @  25/ 30    o  o 

"  cash  paid 2  14  o 

Balanced  by  payment  in  cash    

£77     o  o 


1 88  APPENDICES 

XII 

Newspaper  Advertisements  for  the  Shoe  Industry 

The  shoe  Industry  of  New  England  can  be  followed  in  newspapers 
from  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

"Gammon  Stevens  at  his  shop  at  North  End"  offered,  among  other 
things,  "women's  and  children's  English  shoes  and  galoshes."  —  5o^/o» 
Gazette,  September  3, 1754. 

Blanchard  Cobb  announced  that  he  had  imported  "women's  English 
clogs  and  shoes."  The  following  December,  on  the  8th,  Edmund  Green,  in 
his  shop  on  Union  Street,  added  to  the  above  list,  "children's  ist  and  2nd 
shoes,  shoe  buckles."  —  Boston  Gazette,  June  2,  1755. 

By  1768,  the  Boston  Gazette  showed  one  or  more  advertisements  of 
supplies  of  women's  English  shoes  in  one  paper,  as,  for  example,  that 
of  February  15,  1768.  Public  vendues  had  become  a  regular  feature  of 
Boston's  industrial  and  mercantile  life,  Fred  Wm.  Geyer  in  an  issue 
of  the  Boston  Chronicle  for  May  23,  1768,  offered  his  imported  goods 
ranging  from  cinnamon  to  men's  butt  soles,  French  Indigo,  and  best 
made  Lynn  shoes  at  wholesale  or  retail,  but  for  cash  only.  He  offered 
the  Lynn  shoes  by  the  hundred  pair,  dozen,  or  single  pair,  just  as  he 
offered  the  best  G.  B.  wool-cards  by  the  hogshead,  dozen  or  single  pair. 
By  1769,  an  advertisement  appeared  in  the  Boston  Chronicle  of  No- 
vember 27,  of  a  stock  of  lately  imported  men's  English  shoes  and 
pumps.  This  is  one  of  the  rare  mentions  of  men's  shoes  in  Boston 
papers. 

At  Portsmouth,  New  Hampshire,  the  Gazette  for  1757,  in  its  issue  of 
February  23rd,  prmted  an  advertisement  for  Robert  Traill,  who  had 
English  shoes  for  women,  and  on  May  1,3,  and  20,  the  same  gazette 
gave  the  notice  that  Davenport  and  Wentworth  were  advertising  their 
stock  of  silk  clogs,  toed  clogs,  and  English  shoes. 

The  supply  of  imported  shoes  in  Portsmouth  was  evidently  not 
constant  or  regular,  for,  in  the  issues  of  the  Portsmouth  Gazette  between 
the  above  advertisements,  while  all  other  kinds  of  dress  and  household 
furnishings  are  mentioned,  no  shoes  either  of  domestic  or  foreign  make 
appear.  The  domestic  shoes,  however,  were  being  made  by  custom 
makers  and  perhaps  by  domestic  workers  even  then  up  in  Portsmouth, 
for  the  same  Robert  Traill,  in  the  issue  of  the  New  Hampshire  Gazette 
for  November  15,  1757,  gave  the  notice  that  he  had  received  in  the 
Snow  Perks  from  Bristol,  England,  to  be  sold  at  wholesale  at  his  stores 


APPENDICES  189 

on  the  Long  Wharf  and  his  house,  all  kinds  of  goods,  including  shoe- 
binding  galloons,  shoemakers  tools,  knives,  hammers,  pegging  awls  and 
tacks.  "I  will  engage  to  sell  any  of  the  above  articles  as  cheap,  for 
sterling  money  or  Bills,  as  the  like  are  sold  for,  anywhere  within  250 
miles  of  this  Place,  and  give  three,  six,  and  nine  Months  Credit." 

Four  years  later,  in  the  issues  of  February  20  and  27,  Joseph  Barrel 
advertised  at  wholesale  or  retail,  women's  shoes  of  all  sorts  and  colours, 
and  three  months  later  he  advertised  men's  shoes.  This  mention  of 
wholesale  and  men's  shoes  is  unique  at  this  date.  Evidently  the  custom 
made  or  sale  shoe  has  sufficed  for  the  demand  and  desires  of  the  Ports- 
mouth men  until  now.  The  shoemakers  of  that  locality  had  not  been 
selling  at  wholesale,  nor  the  stores  buying  up  their  product  on  a  large 
scale  for  a  wholesale  trade.  Up  to  this  time,  all  extra  or  sale  shoes  had 
gone  into  the  hands  of  the  general  storekeepers  of  Portsmouth. 

Public  Vendues  of  Shoes 

Then  there  came,  in  1764,  the  auction  stage,  similar  to  that  de- 
veloped in  Boston.  On  August  3,  1764,  and  again  on  August  17,  a 
public  vendue  at  the  auction  rooms  was  advertised  in  the  Portsmouth 
Gaze//e  to  sell  among  other  articles  boots  and  shoes.  "N.B.  Goods  are 
received  in  and  sold  upon  the  best  terms;  secrecy  and  dispatch 
observed." 

The  Weekly  Oracle  of  New  London,  Connecticut,  announced  on 
December  31,  1798: 

A  great  variety  of  ladies  and  children's  shoes,  consisting  of  Black,  Red, 
Green  and  Straw-coloured  Morocco;  Fancy  and  stuff  Shoes;  Men's  shoes 
...  for  sale  by  John  Lewis. 

and  added 

All  those  who  are  indebted  to  said  Lewis  by  Book  ^  or  note  are  requested 
to  call  and  pay  the  same  by  the  15th  of  January  next  or  they  may  expect 
their  accounts  will  be  lodged  in  an  attorney's  hands  for  collection. 

The  expression  of  ''honest  as  a  cobbler"  did  not  always  prove  true  in 
those  days,  for  the  Massachusetts  Spy,  of  March  7,  1798,  printed  a 
notice  of  $40  reward: 

*  This  refers  to  the  custom  of  having  an  account  book,  where  each  customer  had 
a  page  devoted  year  after  year  to  his  account  opposite  a  page  which  showed  the 
store  keeper's  indebtedness  to  him.  The  accounts  were  settled  at  long  intervals, 
and  each  man  signed  his  name  to  the  pages  so  that  the  account  book  became  a 
receipt  book.     (See  frontispiece  for  such  a  case.) 


190  APPENDICES 

Stolen  from  the  subscriber  on  the  night  of  the  27th  a  large  black  horse  . . . 
it  is  supposed  he  was  taken  away  by  a  young  lad  formerly  from  Upton  by  the 
name  of  Kelley ;  he  is  about  20  years  of  age,  five  feet,  9  inches  high  .  .  .  has 
brown  hair,  and  is  a  shoe-maker  or  Cobbler  by  trade. 
Wardsbo rough,  Vermont.  Joseph  Wilder. 

Another  shoemaker-thief  had  a  pleasing  avocation.  He  was  described 
in  the  Salem  Gazette  of  February  24,  1795: 

Stop  Thief 
On  the  night  of  the  25  th  of  January  the  store  of  the  subscriber  was  broken 
open  and  the  following  articles  taken:  —  i  piece  of  Cassimere,  needles  and 
twist.  .  .  .  There  are  the  strongest  marks  of  suspicion  against  a  person  who 
calls  himself  Caleb  Oaks.  He  road  a  dark  bay  horse  which  carries  his  head 
low,  and  trots.  He  is  a  Shoemaker  by  profession  and  plays  on  the  violin 
which  he  keeps  with  him.  Jeremiah  Mayheu. 

Even  forty  years  earlier  there  was  a  dishonest  cordwainer  about, 
according  to  the  Boston  Gazette  of  August  11,  1755,  which  printed  the 
following  advertisement  sent  from  Charlestown,  July  3,  1755: 

Charles  Raymond,  vagrant  and  thief  examined  by  Thomas  Jenness, 
Justice  of  Peace,  found  to  be  60  years  old  and  came  in  1753  from  Bermuda  to 
Connecticut  with  wife  and  two  children  .  .  .  and  has  since  been  strolling 
about  the  country.  He  is  a  Cordwainer  by  trade  and  has  with  him  3  pieces  of 
cotton  and  linen  which  he  confesses  he  has  stolen  at  Sudbury  from  a  person 
unknown  to  him.  He  was  born  in  Somershire,  England,  in  1695,  and  came  to 
Philadelphia  in  i7ioor  1711. 


XIII 

Newspaper  Advertisements  —  Tanneries 

The  Boston  Gazette  of  January  28,  1771  gave  the  following  notice: 

To  be  sold  on  reasonable  Terms,  together  or  in  part  A  Tan-yard,  Currying 
Shop,  Bark-house  etc.  with  a  dwelling  house,  barn,  and  sufl&ciency  of  good 
Land  to  keep  3  cows  and  a  horse;  and  in  a  very  convenient  place  for  a  Tan- 
ner's Business  being  pleasantly  situated  in  Woburn,i  at  corner  of  the  Roads 
leading  to  Andover  and  Billerica. 

Haverhill,  May  3,  1799.  A  Tan-yard,  very  convenient  for  a  Tanner  about 
half  a  mile  Eastward  from  Bridge.  Whoever  has  a  desire  to  hire  said  yard, 
may  have  it  on  reasonable  terms  by  applying  to  Amos  Chase. 

1  Our  modem  Wobum,  Mass.,  is  ten  miles  from  Boston.  Even  at  that  early 
date,  the  tanning  business  had  begun  around  the  general  vicinity  of  Lawrence 
and  Peabody. 


APPENDICES  191 

The  Hampshire  Gazette  ^  of  April  9,  1788,  advertised  to  be  sold 

an  excellent  lot  of  land  lying  in  Ashfield  2-3/4  miles  South  of  the  meeting- 
house, containing  50  acres  on  country  road  leading  from  Northampton 
through  Ashfield. 

Francis  Man  ton  who  advertised  it  added,  "There  is  good  convenience 
on  the  above  mentioned  lot  for  a  clothier  or  tanner,  both  of  which  are 
very  much  wanted."  Just  a  year  later,  in  the  same  paper,^  appeared 
the  following: 

For  Sale,  cheap  for  stock,  half  a  mile  east  of  the  Meeting  house  in  Worth- 
ington  a  convenient  dwelling  house  and  Barn  with  a  Malt  house  and  Shoe- 
maker's Shop.  The  buUdings  well  finished  with  four  acres  of  Land  and  a 
Stream  suflScient  for  a  Clothier's  business  or  a  Tanner.        David  Woods. 

One  wonders  what  stock  this  David  Woods  wanted.  Was  it  leather 
to  make  up  into  shoes  for  export  trad«  ?  Was  he  about  to  become  an 
entrepreneur  in  the  shoe  industry,  or  did  he  intend  to  go  into  grazing, 
or  did  he  want  to  buy  stock  ^  in  some  Western  land  boom  ?  Probably 
the  citizens  of  that  town  knowing  David  Woods's  private  affairs  suffi- 
ciently well,  needed  no  more  explanation  of  this  ambiguous  mention  of 
payment  in  stock, 

John  Chandler  when  he  advertised  in  the  Worcester  Gazette  of  May 
15, 1794  a  Tan-yard  farm  in  Petersham,  spoke  of  it  as  "well  known  and 
well  stocked.  The  farm  is  too  well  known  to  need  any  encomiums." 

The  same  paper  in  the  issue  of  November  5,  1794,  advertised  for 
sale 

A  Tan-yard  with  13  vats,  a  Bark  House  and  Mill,  a  Beam  House  and  a 
Currier's  and  a  Shoe-maker's  Shop  with  half  an  acre  of  Land,  situated  in 
Orange.  The  payment  may  be  made  very  easy.  For  further  particulars  in- 
quire of  Sam  Farwell  of  Westminister  or  Benjamin  Wood  of  Orange. 

Hezekiah  Hutchins  informed  his  customers  in  the  Hampshire 
Gazette  of  November  26,  1788,  that  he  had  on  hand  a  number  of  pair  of 
shoes  which  he  would  exchange  for  Wheat,  Rye,  or  Indian  corn.  He 
had  also  a  "few  Sides  of  upper  and  sole  leather"  which  he  wanted  to 
exchange  for  green  hides. 

May  13,  1795  saw  the  Worcester  Gazette  offering  for  sale  property 
which  furnished  an  opportunity  for  a  combination  of  labor  on  a  farm, 
in  a  tan-yard,  and  a  shoeshop. 

^  Published  in  Springfield,  Mass.         ^  Hampshire  Gazette,  for  April  15,  1787. 
'  The  Salem  Mercury,  of  August  14,  1787,  and  November  27,  had  been  calling 
attention  to  the  Adventures  in  the  Ohio  Company. 


192  APPENDICES 

A  Tan-yard  situated  on  a  road  leading  from  Shrewsbury  meeting-house  to 
Boylston  —  also  about  20  Acres  of  valuable  land  adjoining  said  Tan-yard 
with  a  small  dwelling  House,  Barn,  and  other  necessary  buildings  which  will 
be  sold  without  the  Tan-yard  if  agreeable  to  the  purchaser,  and  will  ac- 
commodate a  Cooper  or  Shoe-maker.  Seth  Pratt. 

September  30,  1795,  another  tan- yard  was  advertised  in  the  Wor^ 
cester  Gazette,  though  the  property  was  in  JafTrey,  New  Hampshire: 

A  Tan-yard  —  one  Acre  land,  small  dwelling  House  and  Barn,  good  well, 
a  large  new  Tan  House,  Beam  House,  and  Currying  Shop,  in  good  repair, 
well  situated;  being  about  100  rds.  east  of  the  meeting  house  in  Jaffrey  on 
the  road  from  Keene  through  New  Ipswich  to  Boston  and  is  as  good  a  stand 
for  the  tanning  business  as  there  is  in  any  country  town  at  that  distance 
from  the  market  as  there  is  no  other  tan-yard  in  town  that  does  any  great 
business;  there  has  been  about  200  hides  and  about  4  to  500  skins  tanned  in 
said  yard  in  season  for  several  years.  John  Cutter. 

One  advertiser  in  the  Worcester  Gazette  of  September  30,  1795,  cer- 
tainly understood  the  good  points  of  his  property;  also  the  needs  of 
markets,  and  the  influence  of  rehearsing  past  successes.  Another 
would-be  seller,  Ariel  Lumbard,  advertising  in  the  Massachusetts  Spy 
for  March  7,  1798,  makes  his  property  so  attractive  that  one  wonders 
why  he  had  to  try  to  sell  it. 

A  New  well  situated  and  convenient  Tan  Yard  about  40  rds  west  of  the 
Meeting  House  in  Granby,  in  the  County  of  Hampshire  and  within  5  mUes  of 
the  Canal,  with  2  Acres  of  land,  a  House,  Bark  House,  and  a  Shop  convenient 
for  a  Currier,  Shoemaker,  or  Saddler,  and  10  Tan  Vats;  together  with  a 
large  supply  of  Hides  and  Bark,  if  appUed  for  soon. 


XIV 

Exemption  for  Shoemakers  during  the  Revolution 

State  of  New  York, 
In  Senate,  March  2d,  1770. 

The  Senate  being  informed  that  the  hides  which  the  Convention  of 
this  State  sometime  ago  put  into  the  hands  of  Mess'*  Matthew  Cantine 
and  John  Anthony  at  Marble  town  to  be  tanned  and  droped  (?)  by 
them  for  the  use  of  this  State  or  some  considerable  part  of  them  are 
prepared  for  working  up  into  shoes. 

Resolved,  if  the  honorable  House  of  Assembly  concur  herein,  That 
Colonel  Peter  T.  Custonius  the  Commissary  appointed  to  procure 
Cloathing  for  the  Troops  raised  under  the  Direction  of  this  State,  take 


APPENDICES  193 

the  said  Quantity  of  Leather  into  his  Care  and  cause  the  same  to  be 
made  up  into  Shoes  with  all  the  possible  Dispatch  to  be  delivered  by 
him  or  his  Order  into  the  Cloathing  Stores  of  this  State:  And  that  Mr. 
Curtenius  be  &  hereby  is  authorized  to  give  Exemption  from  MiUtia 
Duty  to  such  shoemakers  their  Journeymen  &  Apprentices  as  he  shall 
employ  in  making  the  said  Shoes;  to  avail  them  respectively  no  longer 
than  during  the  time  they  shall  severally  be  in  the  said  employ. 
Ordered  that  Mr.  Roosevelt  carry  a  copy  of  the  aforegoing  Resolution 
to  the  Hon>i«  _ 

New  York  in  the  Revolution  as  Colony  and  State,  p.  132.  Records  dis- 
covered &  arranged  by  James  A.  Roberts,  1897.  Pub.  at  Albany,  N.  Y., 
1897. 

XV 

Excerpts  from  the  Wendell  Papers  ^ 

Portsmouth  Sept.  8,  1802. 
Mr.  John  Welsh  jun' 

Dear  Sir— ^ 

My  Son  who  keeps  that  shoe  store  which  belonged  to  our 
late  Friend  Mr.  Abner  Newhall  brought  me  y  letter  of  19th  July  by 
which  I  find  that .  .  .  called  on  him  for  a  Payment  of  76  lbs.  Ballance 
—  Our  poor  Friend  died  the  12th  of  August  of  a  fit  at  the  store  after  a 
short  illness  and  by  his  Death  his  Friends  are  deprived  of  an  amiable 
man  who  had  he  have  lived  w*^  have  proved  an  excellent  member  of 
society.  His  Father  came  too  late  to  see  him  alive.  As  I  have  a  knowl- 
edge of  his  affairs  and  that  by  a  prudent  management  he  will  pay  all 
his  Debts  and  leave  2000  Dollars,  I  have  persuaded  his  Father  to  take 
Administration  and  for  his  encouragement  I  have  consented  that  my 
Son  Jacob  shall  assist  him  under  the  direction  of  Mr.  John  Badger 
Tinman  and  a  neighbor  to  the  deceased.  My  Quitting  Business  long 
ago  made  me  decline  taking  any  charge  of  his  affairs  but  as  an  Adviser. 

The  Pleasure  I  had  of  a  short  acquaintance  with  you  and  the  Possi- 
biUty  of  some  future  Connections  with  my  Son  Jacob  who  tho  young 
has  obtained  the  character  of  a  very  promising  and  surprising  genius. 
He  has  the  care  and  division  of  the  whole  Stock  in  trade  of  the  de- 
ceased and  the  Sales  go  on  as  rapid  as  ever.  I  expect  old  Mr.  Newhall 

'  These  are  in  the  possession  of  John  Wendell's  grandson,  Prof.  Barrett  Wendell 
of  Harvard  University. 


194  APPENDICES 

will  be  here  soon  and  I  shall  persuade  him  to  pay  the  creditors  off  as 
fast  as  is  prudent.  The  law  allows  him  a  year  to  look  into  his  affairs 
but  as  I  well  remember  that  Abner  gave  me  all  his  letters  from  you  and 
that  your  Boot  Legs  came  to  him  on  very  reasonable  Terms,  I  shall  in- 
fluence the  old  Gentleman  to  pay  you  at  least  50  Dollars;  and  as  I  find 
my  Son  proves  so  very  attractive  to  his  Business  I  have  thought  proper 
to  encourage  him  and  for  that  purpose,  if  you  wish  to  continue  the 
shipping  of  y  Manufactory  and  will  ship  to  me  200  Dollar  worth  such 
as  you  sent  to  Mr.  Newhall,  my  Son  shall  sell  them  and  if  you  want 
Sole  leather  shipped  you  or  anything  else  or  if  you  wish  to  procure  a 
quantity  of  Barley  for  your  Market  or  Bills  of  Exchange  I  will  intro- 
duce him  to  y  Business  and  as  he  is  under  age  I  will  be  answerable  for 
his  Honesty  and  Faithfulness.  Mr.  Badger  will  write  you  about  your 
debt  but  he  can  do  nothing  without  old  Mr.  Newhall's  consent  and  I 
will  put  in  a  word  to  him.     I  am  with  Esteem 

Your  Friend  and  (etc) 

John  Wendell, 
claim  vs.  Estate  of  A.  Newhall  $76.16 
Coppy  of  Letter  to  John  Welsh  Jr. 
Sept,  8,  1802. 

Evidently  this  John  Wendell  had  had  a  general  store  (previous  to  this 
correspondence  of  1802-03)  where  he  sold  shoes,  among  other  mer- 
chandise, for  this  page  appears: 

John  Wendell  Esq.  1798  acct.  with  his  son  George  W.  Wendell. 

1797    Debtor  £    s.    d. 

Aug.    9    To    6  pair  shoes  @  5/pair  i  10 

Mar.    7      "    16  pr.  men's  shoes  @  s  /  pa^ir  4 

"     I  "    new  boots i     4 

Credits  his  son  by  i  pr.  of  boots  returned i     4 

Mar.  24         "       by  3  pair  men's  shoes  5  /   15     5 

Aug.  20         "        "  shoes  for  boys  8    3 

Abner  Newhall's  acct  settled  June  23,  1800 

1800  John  Wendel  Squire  to  Abner  Newhall  Dr D.    C. 

6m    2th    To  cash 20    o 

9th    To  cash 40    o 

14th    To  cash 60    o 

i8th    To  cash 20    o 

nth    To   I  pr.  of  morroco  Shoes i  25 

men's  i  71 

23rd    To  cash 44  74 

"D.  is  sign  he  used  for  dollars 
€."""««   cents 


APPENDICES  195 

The  next  letter  shows  how  Mr.  Wendell  got  into  the  shoe  business: 

Portsmouth,  Dec.  23, 1802. 
Mr.  John  Welsh  Junr. 

Dear  Sir: 

Since  my  last  I  am  without  your  favor.  I  wrote  you  in  fav 
etc.  ...  I  was  Bondsman  for  our  late  friend  Abner  for  1000  dollars 
to  Hammon  &  Co  of  Boston  and  finding  that  if  the  utmost  attention 
is  not  paid  to  the  sales  of  his  Stock  left  on  hand  his  Estate  would 
be  greatly  insufficient  to  pay  his  debts  and  as  I  was  so  largely  in- 
volved for  him,  I  went  to  Lynn  to  see  the  old  Gentleman  his  father 
but  could  not  get  him  to  secure  me.  I  thereupon  insisted  that  he 
should  do  something  or  deHver  the  Property  into  my  hand  which  he 
has  agreed  to  so  I  was  his  Bondman  for  his  Administration,  and  in 
Consequence  the  property  has  been  delivered  to  me  and  my  son  Jacob 
Wendell  has  now  the  whole  charge  of  the  Store  under  me  and  Mr. 
Badger  having  full  Business  of  his  own  wishes  not  the  Boot  Legs  sent 
upon  his  Acct  unless  shipped  ahready  in  which  Case  he  will  be  respon- 
sible and  as  he  is  a  stranger  to  you  I  will  see  you  secured  under  those 
circumstances  you  will  please  to  ship  200  pr.  of  the  best  of  your  boot 
legs  addressed  to  me  on  my  acct.  and  risk  to  Boston  to  Mr.  Bradley  to 
reship  me.  I  please  myself  with  opening  an  extensive  profitable 
business  with  you  in  the  flour  and  leather  business  as  I  have  sons  well 
calculated  to  ingross  that  employment  whatever  terms  you  ship  your 
articles  on  shall  be  complied  with  immediately.  Boot  legs  if  sent  soon 
will  be  good  articles  for  sale.  Suppose  I  was  to  ship  200  dollars  of  Shoes 
will  they  be  good  remittance  ?  If  my  Hf e  is  preserved  I  will  make  it 
Worthy  your  attention  to  Ship  largely  in  future.  My  daughter  Dolly 
is  Very  genteely  settled  with  the  Gentleman  to  whom  she  was  en- 
gaged, Captain  Randall  of  a  fine  East  India  Copper  Bottom  Ship  and 
is  going  out  on  another  Voyage  to  India.  After  which  I  doubt  not  he 
will  retire  from  Trade.  Mrs.  Wendell  and  I  are  well  and  all  join  me  in 
our  Respectf ull  Compliments  to  yourseh  and  Pardner  in  Trade  or  your 
Pardner  in  matrimony  if  that  has  taken  Place.  I  am  with  Great 
Sincerity  your  devoted  and  assured  Friend.  John  Wendell. 

Lynn  the  4°^°  6 —  1803. 
Respecked  Friend 

I  Received  thy  letter  haveing  Dat  the  3'°°  22  which 
informed  me  of  your  welfare  and  these  few  lines  is  to  informe  thee 


196  APPENDICES 

that  we  enjoye  our  helths.  Thee  wrote  in  thy  letter  that  thee  wish  for 
the  Creditors  to  Come  and  take  shoes.  I  Dont  hold  it  worth  while  to 
say  anything  to  them  about  for  those  that  have  not  took  anything 
always  have  declined  and  I  Expect  they  remain  the  same.  Thee  rote 
nothing  about  my  Shoes.  I  wish  for  thee  to  make  the  best  of  them  an 
turn  them  in  to  Cash  as  Quick  as  thee  Can  for  I  am  in  scant  of  Cash 
very  much  my  Do  is  now  $113.34-  I  have  not  had  my  part  of  money 
that  thee  will  see  by  Compareing  the  a  Compts  together.  My  love  to 
thee  and  thy  family.  Lydia's  love  to  thee  in  particular  our  little  gerl 
goes  nicely. 

Ly Newhall's  Letter  from  Lynn. 

Portsmouth,  March  24th,  1803, 

Messrs.  Jenkins  and  Welsh. 

Gentlemen 

Your  fav  of  7th  Jan  7  I  received  and  observed  the  Con- 
tents. I  wrote  you  a  line  to  Capt.  Ayers  bound  to  S.  CaroUna  and 
Wilmington  with  two  trunks  of  shoes  which  they  were  to  sell  or  return 
if  they  sold  they  were  to  send  the  money  to  you  for  my  acct.  I  wrote 
you  M.  Badger  had  received  the  Boot  Legs  and  Jacob  has  them  selling 
at  his  store  and  I  expect  will  make  some  remittances  as  I  suppose  you 
gave  him  some  directions  what  to  do  I  have  been  looking  out  for  the 
Shoes,  I  wrote  for  but  is  no  damage  because  Badgers  are  not  all  sold  — ■ 
I  have  told  my  sons  customers  that  I  expect  some  extra  legs  from  Balti- 
more, the  Season  of  selling  is  not  so  good  as  the  late  Season  and  there 
happens  to  be  a  large  quantity  of  them  sent  here  from  Boston  and 
Salem. 

By  Capt.  Edmund  Fernald  I  have  sent  two  Trunks  of  shoes  for  Sale 
and  if  he  sells  I  shall  instruct  him  to  remit  you  the  money  or  ship  the 
two  Trunks  to  your  address  at  Baltimore  from  Norfolk.  They  are 
charged  at  the  first  cost  in  Lynn  without  additional  cost  or  Freight  if 
you  realize  the  first  cost  it  is  as  much  as  I  expect.  They  are  of  the  best 
quaUty  of  Stuff  Shoes.  I  have  paid  off  a  number  of  the  Creditors  of  our 
friend  Mr.  NewhaU  in  shoes  at  their  first  cost  rather  than  wait  and  if 
the  estate  proves  insufficient  they  are  to  allow  back  the  deficiency  and 
if  you  have  a  mind  you  may  take  your  Ballance  the  same  way.  Mr. 
Welsh  may  be  assured  that  I  shall  do  my  utmost  to  save  him  whole. 
The  insolvency  (if  any)  will  arise  from  a  number  of  Bad  Debts  and 
losses  on  advantures  the  Way  that  I  am  connected  with  the  estate  is  by 
bemg  my  friend's  Bondsman  for  $1000  and  I  am  under  a  necessity  of 


APPENDICES  197 

keeping  it  from  eventually  being  so  —  the  demands  are  nearly  $1000  to 
my  very  great  surprise  ....  etc. 

Your  devoted  Friend 

John  Wendell. 

Account  of  Stock  in  Jacob  ^  Store  taken  April  i,  1803 

234  pair  Black  Morocco  @  6/  $234.50 

201   do  Col'i      ditto           7/  234.50' 

22  do  Lamb  Skin  kid  6/  22.00 
90  do  American  ditto  7/6  112.50 

187  do  Stiff  slippers  4/  124.67 

236  do  of         ditto    4/  157-33 

90  do  of  Misses  ditto  4/0  60.00 

76  do  of  Misses  kid  4/6  5  7  00 

56  do  English  Mor°  and  kid  8/6  79-33 

44  do  English  kid  10/6  77.00 

32  do  Misses  Mor°  2/6  13-33 

7  do  calf  skin  slippers  4/6  5.25 

13  do    do    do     ditto    with  heels  5/3  ii-37 

23  do  do  do  ditto  with  heels  4/  15-33 
18  pair  Misses  calf  skin  3/9  11.25 

16  do  Mens  Mor°  sUppers  7/6  20.00 
II  do  Boys  calf  skin  shoes  5/  9.17 

8  do  Boys  calf  skin  Pumps  5/3  7.00 
8  do  Boys  course  Shoes  4/  5.33 

17  do  Mens  calf  skin  8/  22.66 

14  do  Mens  fine  ditto  9/6  22.17 
65  do  children  Moro  and  calf  skin  2/  21.66 
13^  skins  Mor°  Red  and  Green  10/  22.50 

7    sheep  skins  3/  3.50 

(Some  items  omitted) 

The  whole  stock  totalled  $1528.25  worth  of  shoes  and  leather. 

Wendell  as  Middleman  Retailer 

Invoice  of  10  Boxes  of  Shoes  and  Boots  left  in  the  Hands  of  Jacob 
Wendell  of  Portsmouth  .  .  .  for  Sales  on  Commission  on  Actt.  and 
Risque  of  Mr.  Wm.  Rose,  merchant  at  Lynn  in  Mass.  via, 

*  Jacob  Wendell,  son  of  John  Wendell,  had  taken  over  Abner  Newhall's  store, 
and  was  running  it  by  and  with  the  advice  of  his  father.  This  record  gives  a  good 
idea  of  the  volume  of  shoe  business  which  had  been  the  outcome  of  the  bondsman- 
entrepreneur-shoe-merchant  business  affairs  of  John  Wendell. 

2  The  shilling  was  reckoned  here  as  16  2/3  cents.   201  pr.  at  7  (7  sh)  =  $234.50. 


198  APPENDICES 

Box  I  contains  140  pr.    Black  Morocco  Slip.  Nos.  i  @  5/6  $128.33 


2 


130  pair      «            «          «  «        @5/5  „g  ^5 

4  "        125    "        "            "           "  "         @s/6  114.58 

5  "          6s    "    Mens  fine  shoes                     @  7/  75-84 

5  "          12    "    Black  Heels  M"  SUp.             @  6/6  13.00 

6  "          31     "    ditto                                       ®/6/  33.58 


13  boxes  in  all  for  1077  pairs  in  all  totaling  $1099.45 

The  above  shoes  I  have  left  with  Jacob  Wendell  to  be  sold  and  ac- 
counted for  agreeable  to  his  receipt  given  me  this  day,  July  i,  1804. 

Signed         Wm.  Rose. 

Letters  from  domestic  workers  as  far  away  as  Haverhill  have  been 
saved. 

Haverhill  Dec.  5, 1804. 
Mr.  Wendall 

Sir  I  receivd  your  Ltter  and  I  will  make  the  boots  so  you  can  have 
them  the  first  next  week  and  will  send  them  by  Jacob  I  did  not  see  Mr. 
Done  but  I  left  the  letter  and  I  shall  send  you  some  shoes  and  Boots  as 
soon  as  Possible  —  this  from  your  friend  and  humble  servant 

Samuel  Emery. 

Haverhill  Dec.  15, 1804. 
Mr.  Wendall  Sir  — 

I  have  sent  you  20  Mens  calf  skin  shoes  which  you 
are  to  sell  for  me  and  it  is  agreed  that  you  shall  have  for  your  trouble 
all  that  you  can  get  above  7/6  for  and  either  to  return  the  .  .  . 

from  your  friend 

Samuel  Emery. 

20  pair  calfskin  shoes  @  7/6  $25.00 
P.S.  I  have  sent  a  pair  slippers  in  the  Bundle  and  I  wish  you  to  de- 
liver them  to  Mr.  Nalty  Pitman  and  if  you  want  any  more,  send  by 
Jacob  and  I  will  send  them.  S.  Emery. 

I  shall  send  you  some  Boots  next  week  and  I  shall  be  over  in  6  weeks. 


APPENDICES 


199 


John  Wendell  Esq'  to  Joseph  Moulton  Jr. 


Dr. 


June  12th 

To  2  New  Shoes  and  to  toeing  2 

6/3           $1.04 

Sept.    4 

To  2  New  Shoes  and  setting  2 

S/6               .92 

Aug.  16 

To  settling  2  shoes 

1/6                  .35 

1805 

June     7 

To  3  shoes  and  setting  one 

7/9                 1-27 

Sept.  18 

To  3  New  Shoes  2  old  i  toeing  2 

12/3              2.04 

Nov.    I 

To  I  Shoe  and  Setting  4 

5/                 .84 

1806 

Feb.  28 

To  I  new  steel  toed  shoe 

2/9                .46 

May  20 

To  3  New  Shoes  and  Setting  4 

9/                i-So 

1808 

Jany    8 

To  corking  4  shoes  and  setting  etc 

6/                1. 00 

Portsmouth,  22  Jan.  1805 

Rec'd  Payment  in  full 

by  JacoB  Wendell 

Joseph 

Moulton,  Jr. 

Interesting  evidence  of  business  methods  can  be  gleaned  from  these 
Wendell  papers. 

Portsmouth  Dec.  17,  1803. 

Accoimt  Sales  of  85  Pair  Boot  Legs  Sold  for  Acct,  of  Mr.  John 
Badger  at  half  profits  the  same  being  part  of  an  invoice  received  from 
Mr.  John  Welch  of  Baltimore  on  said  Badger's  account. 


By  account  rendered  of  said  85 

Pairs  of  boot  legs  amounting  to 
The  above  account 

1803  to  Mr.  John  Badger  for  the  first  cost  of  the 

Dec.  Boot  Legs  being  85  pair  on  average  @  90  cts. 
To  Jacob  Wendell  for  his  half  profit 
To  John  Badger  for  his  half  profit 


$102.18 
76.50 

12.84 

12.84 


Mr.  John  Badger  in  acct  w'*"  Jacob  Wendell 


To  2  pair  Boot  legs 
Mr.  Smith  and  (?)  . 

To  Robert  Mindun 
5  pair  in  acct.  Sales 
To  cash  paid  John 
Wendell  Esq.  and  2 
boot  legs  to  ditto 

..} 

\ 
/ 

pair  • 
Dol. 

2.58 

6.33 

78.44 
2.50 

By  the  first  cost  of 

85  pr.  boot  legs  as 

above 

By  your  half  proffets 

$89.85 

76.50 
12.84 


$89.34 


200  APPENDICES 

RETAtt  Trade  —  Typical  Bills 
Mr.  Samuel  Sprague 

To  Jacob  Wendell        Dr. 
1802 
Dec.  IS    To  I  pair  Children  Shoes     2/3  $  .38 


Portsmouth 

1804. 

Rec'd  Payment, 

Messrs.  N.  S. 

and  W.  Pierce 

To  Jacob  Wendell 

Dr. 

1802 

Jan. 

29 

To 

I  pair  men's  Shoes 

9/ 

Feb. 

12 

To 

I  pair  M°  Slip,  del** 

per  order 

7/6 

Apr. 

2 

To 

I  pair  Mens  Calf  Skin  Shoes  del''  (Kennard) 

9/ 

1.50 

I-2S 
1.50 

Portsmouth  Jan.  28,  1804 
Jacob  Wendell 

Bt  of  James  Goodrich 

10  pair  Mens  Calf  skins  shoes  @  7/  $11.67 

15  pr.    boys  shoes  Calf  skin  @  4/  11-25 

12  pair  ditto  thick  Shoes  @  3/9  7.50 

2  pair  Mens  Calf  Skin  Common  @  6/  2.00 

Rec'd  Payment  by 

Jacob  Wendell 

James  Goodrich. 

Invoice  of  Sundry  Shoes  Rec"*  of  Saml  Emery  to  sell  for  him  and  if  not  sold  to  be 
returned  on  demand. 

Portsmouth,  Dec.  17,  1804. 
20  pair  Men's  shoes  @  7/6  25.00 

Another  set  of  pages  in  a  small  account  book  are  headed  Retail:  — . 
They  give  an  account  of  sales  of  shoes  sold  by  Jacob  Wendell  for  James 
Goodrich  and  Moses  Parker  consisting  of  men's  calf  shoes  and  boys' 
thick  calf,  etc.  These  were  generally  sold  one  pair  at  a  time  for  prices 
varying  according  to  the  shoes  from  g2<ji  to  $1.75  and  generally  for  cash. 

XVI 

Excerpts  from  the  Batcheller  Papers 

To  Oliver  Ward  *  belongs  the  honor  of  starting  the  manufacture  of  sale 
shoes  in  North  Brookfield;  and  his  was  the  earliest  establishment  of  the 
kind  west  of  Worcester.  ...  He  learned  the  tanner's  trade  of  Charles 
Brown  of  Grafton;  came  from  Grafton  to  North  Brookfield  a  little  before 
1810  and  for  a  short  time  carried  on  the  tanning  business  in  Spunky  Hollow. 
He  started  a  shoe  manufactory  here  in  1810,  depending  mainly  on  the 
Southern  market  for  sales  of  his  goods. 

*  Temple:  History  of  North  Brookfield,  pp.  269-272. 


APPENDICES  20 1 

Tyler  Batcheller,  who  had  learned  the  trade  in  Grafton,  worked  as 
journeyman  for  Mr.  Ward  for  eight  years,  living  in  his  family  until 
1 819.  Mr.  Ezra  Batcheller,  a  younger  brother,  also  learned  the  trade 
of  shoemaking  at  Mr.  Ward's,  living  in  the  latter's  family  for  six  years. 
In  1 819,  Tyler  Batcheller  ^  commenced  business  on  his  own  account  at 
the  Wetherbee  house,  where  he  lived  with  his  family,  the  back  part  of 
the  house  serving  as  his  manufactory.  At  first  his  entire  business  con- 
sisted only  in  what  shoes  he  could  make  with  his  own  hands;  soon, 
however,  he  took  into  his  service  one  or  two  apprentices  and  his 
brother  Ezra. 

The  private  expense  account  of  Tyler  Batcheller  before  he  became  an 
entrepreneur  and  began  to  manufacture  on  his  own  capital  in  181 9,  is  a 
wonderfully  vivid  illustration  of  the  saying  that  "Capital  arises  slowly 
and  solely  from  savings  devoted  to  the  production  of  wealth."  For  the 
first  three  ^  years  of  his  service  as  apprentice  with  Mr.  OUver  Ward, 
Tyler  Batcheller  was  still  in  his  minority  and  his  stipulated  wages  went 
to  his  father.  Over  and  above  this,  during  those  seven  years  he  earned 
and  saved  five  hundred  dollars,  the  interest  of  which  was  his  self- 
restricted  annual  allowance  for  clothing  for  several  years  until  he  went 
into  business  on  his  own  account  in  18 10. 

The  first  shoes  they  made  were  chiefly  of  a  low  priced  quality  espe- 
cially adapted  to  the  Southern  trade.  .  .  .  In  182 1,  he  purchased  the 
'  Skerry  House  '  and  farm  in  the  centre  of  what  is  now  the  main  village 
of  the  town  of  Brookfield.^  Here  he  continued  his  business  in  an  out- 
building on  the  premises  for  three  years.  In  1824,  having  taken  into 
his  service  several  additional  employes,  he  built  a  small  two-story  shop 
which  is  now  a  part  of  his  immense  structure,  known  far  and  wide  as 
the  'Big  Shop,'  into  which,  on  January  i,  1825,  he  removed  his  busi- 
ness and  took  his  brother  Ezra  as  partner,  under  the  firm  name  of  T. 
&  E.  Batcheller.  From  this  time  forward  to  the  end  of  Tyler's  life,  the 
two  brothers  were  associated  as  partners.  Tyler  attended  to  the  pur- 
chase of  stock  and  to  all  other  business  abroad,  while  Ezra  was  the 
eflScient  and  popular  superintendent,*  almost  always  at  home  and  at  his 

'  Temple:  History  of  North  Brookfield,  p.  270. 

'  Ibid.,  p.  273. 

'  This  is  where  the  large  new  Batcheller  factories,  famous  in  the  6o's  and  70's, 
stood. 

*  This  account  of  the  Batcheller  Brothers,  written  for  Temple,  the  author  of 
the  History  of  North  Brookfield,  by  Charles  Adams  who  was  bookkeeper  for  the 
Batchellers  for  over  a  score  of  years,  has  a  personal  atmosphere  that  seems  worth 
preserving. 


202  APPENDICES 

post,  giving  direction  to  all  matters  pertaining  to  the  manufactory.  . . . 
"The  Deacon  (meaning  Tyler)  and  Ezra"  was  the  general  name  for  the 
brother  partners. 

XVII 

Pages  from  the  Batcheller  Accounts' 

An  account  book,  called  Ledger  A,  contains  all  the  business  transac- 
tions of  the  BatcheUer  firm  from  January  i,  1830  to  January  6,  1834. 
Sample  pages  are  given  here  to  show  the  volume,  prices  and  organiza- 
tion of  the  business. 

Suggestions  of  the  leather  and  other  supplies,  bought  1830-31. 

Dr.  P-  R.  SotJTHwicK  Cr. 

1830  1830 


Sept.    4 

To  Sundries 

277 

$1112.44 

Aug. 

14 

By  leather 

230 

$651.64 

u 

25 

u 

<l 

243 

460.80 

III  2.44 

1112.44 

Oct.     4 

To  Draft 

301 

258.86 

Oct. 

4 

By  leather 

301 

258.86 

«      20 

"   Note 

327 

117.7s 

« 

a 

"7-75 

«      28 

"   Drafts 

338 

796.68 
1173-29 

u 

u 

796.68 
1173.29 

Nov.  29 

To  cash 

29 

527-74 

Nov. 

10 

u 

a 

7 

259.67 

« 

29 

u 

a 

29 

268.07 

527-74  527-74 

Ledger  pages  show  that  the  T.  &  E.  BatcheUer  firm  bought  following 
goods  from  various  concerns: 

Leather  from  Jones,  Wood  &  Co.  Enfield,  Conn. 

Leather  from  Merrick  and  Dawley  Worcester,  Mass. 

Shoes  from  Oliver  Ward  N.  Brookfield,  Mass. 
Store  *  supplies  (Blankets,  cloth,  etc.)  from  Newhall 

&  Co.,  West  Brookfield,  Mass. 

Boxes  from  Elijah  Bates  N.  Brookfield,  Mass. 

Lasts  from  Harrington  (Sam).  New  Braintree,  Mass. 

Thread  (large  quantities),  from  Nath.  Faxon.  Boston,  Mass. 

Boots  &  Leather  from  Thomas  Pierce,  Spencer,  Mass. 

Nails  from  James  Butler,  Boston,  Mass. 

Twine  from  Allen  Pratt,  Boston,  Mass. 

*  The  account  books  of  the  Batcheller  firm  covering  the  period  from  1830  to  1895 
are  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Francis  BatcheUer  of  North  Brookfield. 

^  Evidently  the  Batchellers  ran  a  general  store,  just  as  the  Littlefields  did,  in 
East  Stoughton. 


APPENDICES 


203 


Customers  and  their  Distribution,  1830 
{Taken  just  as  the  accounts  follow  in  the  ledger) 


Joseph  Whitney  &  Co., 
Wilson  L.  Becktell  &  Co., 
Stoddard  Davis, 
Silas  D.  Edson, 
Merriam  &  Broaddus, 
Robinson  &  Olds, 
Aaron  D.  Harmon, 
Asahel  Weston, 
Goble  &  Thomas, 
Walter  Clarke, 

Alden  &  Co. 

Shipman,  Robinson  &  Co. 
Luke  Reed  &  Co. 
Joshua  C.  Oliver  &  Co. 
John  Albree  &  Co. 
Cheever  &  Stafford, 
Mitchell  &  Bryant, 
C.  Newhall  &  Co. 
Gage,  Stevens  &  Co. 
Knower  &  Winslow, 
Gibbs  &  Coyle, 
N.  E.  Bank 
Nath.  Cooper 


Customers  1830-31. 


New  Customers  1831-32. 


Shaw,  Tiffany  &  Co. 
J.  J.  Hammett, 
Bent  &  Wyman, 
Jones  &  Woodward 
A.  P.  Childs, 
Ezekel  Wood, 
Jacob  W.  Weaver, 
Otis  Spear  &  Co. 
Grifl&n  Stedman, 
Halsey  &  Utter, 
Abraham  Skinner, 


Boston,  Mass. 
Philadelphia,  Pa. 
Charleston,  S.  C. 
Alexandria,  Louisiana 

u  a 

New  York  * 
Alexandria,  La. 
Baltimore,  Md. 
Newark,  N.  J. 
Washington,  D.  C. 

Philadelphia,  Pa. 
Newark,  N.  J. 
Augusta,  Ga. 
Philadelphia,  Pa. 
Pittsburgh,  Pa. 
Stocking,  Yates  Co.  N.  Y. 
Boston,  Mass. 
Boston,  Mass. 
Cincinnati,  Ohio. 
Roxbury,  Mass. 
Washington,  D.  C. 
Boston,  Mass. 
Charleston,  S.  C. 


Baltimore,  Md. 
Pittsburgh,  Pa. 
Philadelphia,  Pa. 
Baltimore,  Md. 
Pittsburgh,  Pa. 
Savannah,  Ga. 
Louisville,  Ky. 
Baltimore,  Md. 
Hartford,  Conn. 
Newark,  N.  J. 
S.  Brookfield,  Mass. 


*  This  firm  bought  on  March  6,  1830,  $754.80  worth  of  shoes. 


204 


APPENDICES 


New  Customers  1832-33. 


Calvin  How  &  Co. 
Amos  K.  Smith 
C.  B.  Granniss  &  Co. 
C.  R.  &  T.  J.  Comstock, 
Adam  Lee  &  Co. 
Christopher  Huntington, 
A.  Wood  &  Company 
Gideon  Lee  &  Co. 
Benj.  Abbott, 
Moses  Dickinson, 
Squier  &  Ross, 
Thomas  R.  Brooks 
Amasa  Walker 
C.  R.  &  A.  Stone, 
Eveleth  &  Wood, 
George  W.  Holland, 
John  Haseltine  &  Co. 
Woods  &  Wrigkt, 
Spear  &  Pattin, 


New  York  City,  N.  Y. 
New  Salem,  Mass. 
New  York  City,  N.  Y. 
Hartford,  Conn. 
Rahway,  N.  J. 
Hartford,  Conn. 
Savannah,  Ga. 
New  York,  N.  Y. 
Providence,  R.  I. 
Detroit,  Mich. 
Rahway,  N.  J. 
Baltimore,  Md. 
Boston,  Mass. 
Shrewsbury,  Mass. 
Boston,  Mass. 
New  York  City,  N.  Y. 
Philadelphia,  Pa. 
New  York  City,  N.  Y. 
New  York  City,  N.  Y. 


Samples  of  Accounts. 
Baicheller  Papers,  Ledger  A,  p.  303,  G.  W.  Holland  as  customer,  1830. 


Dr. 

1830 
Feb.     6 
"      16 
Mar.    3 
Apr.     5 


George  W.  Holland,  N.  Y. 
to  shoes  96.10 

"       "  51-30 

"       «  48.60 

"       "  204.00 


Cr. 


1830 

July  20    To  shoes 

Aug.    7 

9 
16 

33 


u  a 

a  u 

u  a 

»  u 


Feb. 
« 


6  1830  by  leather  158.78 

16  "  check  T&E.B.  33.92 


Apr.     s 


draft 


400.00 

1830 

1830 

Apr.     6 

To  shoes 

210.00 

June  26    By  accpt. 

24 

«         u 

75.00 

July     9      "    cash 

June  19 

u         a 

499- 

"      19      «    Sunds, 

July   10 

a         u 

762. 

1546.00 

811.50 
144.16 
811.50 
959.00 
1547-50 


Aug.    9 

Sep.   21 

"      21 

"      21 

«      21 

22 


By  cash 


"  note 

"  cash 

a        u 

"  notes 


207.30 

400.00 

285.00 

249.50 

1011.50 

1546.00 

811.50 

1389-52 
552.90 
303-36 
411.84 
805.40 


APPENDICES 


20S 


Ledger  A,  p.  306,  Spear  6*  Pattin,  N.  Y. 


Dr. 

Spear  &  Pattin 

,N.Y. 

Cr. 

1830 

1830 

Feb.     6 

To  shoes 

II0.7S 

July 

31 

By  transfer 

110.75 

Sep.   21 

u        u 

368.60 

Oct. 

22 

"   shoes 

6.00 

"      29 

"  boots 

196.88 

Nov. 

2 

"    boots 

9-37 

Oct.     8 

"  shoes 

191.25 

Dec. 

28 

"   drafts 

983.01 

«      20 

u         a 

50.40 

Nov.    2 

U            tt 

191.25 

1109.13 

1109.13 

1831 

1831 

Mar.    4 

To  shoes 

579.00 

May 

21 

by 

889.00 

"      14 

u        u 

160.00 

Apr.   16 

u         a 

150.00 

889.00 

889.00 

1831 

1831 

May  24 

To  shoes 

225.00 

Aug. 

8 

by  note 

225.00 

Aug.  23 

«         u 

712. 

Oct. 

29 

a        u 

2290.62 

Sep.     9 

u         u 

384. 

13 

u        u 

170. 

balance 

219.50 

21 

u         u 

400. 

Oct.    12 

u         u 

617. 

"      17 

a         u 

220. 

"      29 

interest 

7.12 

2735.12 


2735-12 


Ledger  A,  p.  jog.    Stoddard  6*  Davis,  Charleston,  S.  C. 


Dr. 

Cr. 

1830 

1830 

Feb.  II 

To  shoes 

324- 

May 

3    by  accpt. 

399-39 

May    8 

"   sunds. 

75-39 

399-39 

399-39 

1830 

1830 

Aug.  30 

to  shoes 

600. 

Nov. 

20    by  accpt. 

600.00 

Oct.    26 

u         u 

399-50 

Jan. 

8,1831  By" 

1197.50 

Nov.  29 

u         a 

461.50 

"      30 

u         u 

336.50 

1797.50 


1797-50 


2o6 


APPENDICES 


Ledger  A,  p.  309.     Stoddard  6*  Davis,  Charleston,  S.  C.  —  continued 


Dr. 
1831 

Mar.  21     to  shoes 

"  int. 


i83i» 

240.00 

Aug.     8    by  note 

1148.75 

Sep.     8      "  accpt, 

360 

1392.3s 


Cr. 


243.60 
1148.75 


1392-35 


Ledger  A,  p.  321.    Luke  Reed  6*  Co.    Augusta,  Ga. 


Dk. 

1830 

Aug.    6    to  shoes 


16     " 
30     « 


1830 

Oct.     5    to  shoes 

Nov.  16    «       « 


1831 

June  28  to  shoes 

July   27  «       " 

Aug.  29  "       " 

Sept.    7  "       " 

Oct.    15  interest 


836.30 

700. 

375- 


1830 

Aug.    6    by  draft 

Sep.    21      "      " 


1911.30 

1830 

755- 

Dec.  II 

by  acct. 

774-SO 

1529-50 

1831 

961.32 

July  30 

by  accpt, 

982.50 

Oct.    15 

"  notes 

957-5° 

321.87 

25.11 

Cr. 

836.30 
1075- 


1911.30 
1529-50 

1529-50 

961.32 
2286.98 


3248.30 


3248.30 


Men  Workers 

Nathan  Snow         1  „      ,  •       ,       „        .  ^  . 

Mathew  Edmonds/    ""^^^  '^°^'   '  ^^'^  *^°7,  $237,  $241  at  a  tune. 

Gideon  B.  Jenks. 

Wm.  Levering  paid  $187  at  a  time. 

John  Watson  paid  $220  at  a  time. 

Leonard  Stoddard. 

Josiah  Hunter. 

Wm.  Jenks. 

Chellus  Keep. 

Otis  Daniels. 

Luther  Holmes. 

'  In  1833  —  August  5  to  November  20,  the  same  firm  bought  $3,787.07  worth  of 
shoes. 


APPENDICES 


207 


Women  Workers  *  (closing  and  binding  Brogan  Uppers) 


Betsy  Perry. 
Dolly  Hubbard. 
Mercy  Doane. 
Nancy  How. 
Mrs.  Wilder. 
Maris  Edgerton. 
Mary  Potter, 
Anna  Spooner. 
Hannah  Jenks. 
DoUy  Ayers. 


Mercy  Wait. 
Rhoda  Harwood. 
Martha  Keith. 
Mary  Green. 
Widow  Lucy  Lane. 
Eliza  Hooker. 
Persis  Howe. 
Huldah  Knight. 
Nancy  Blake. 
Rachael  Ajtcs. 


Notes  Payable,'^  i  830-1 831. 

March      18,  1830  to  January  19,  1831,  amounted  to  $20,075.51 
February    4,  1831  to  April       27,  1831,  amounted  to    18,284.05 

Notes  Receivable 

January  21,  1830  to    February    4,  1831  amounted  to  $27,784.81 
«         to   AprU  20  «         «     38,172.28 


XVIII 

The  Barber  Statistics  ^ 


Date  1837 
Town 

Pop. 

Pr.  Shoes 

Pr.  Boots 

Value 

Males 

Females 

Franklin  County 
Erving  

292 
1,018 

847 

1,518 
1,810 

9,236 

738 

1,802 

744 

36,000 
9,053 

2,050 

10,000 
6,230 

4,345 
4,000 

5,250 

58,650 

7,956 

16,000 

27,743 
8,498 

125 

56 
42 

Shelburne    

Wendell 

Hampden  County 
Brimfield 

50 

Palmer 

Springfield 

Wales  ; 

5 

Wilbraham  

^  These  were  either  spinsters  or  widows.  Probably  many  other  women,  wives 
and  daughters,  were  doing  the  same  work,  but  the  account  appears  in  the  name 
of  the  husbands  who  took  out  the  work  and  collected  the  pay. 

*  The  amount  of  these  notes,  payable  and  receivable,  gives  an  idea  of  the  volume 
of  the  business  and  of  the  amount  of  credit  an  entrepreneur  could  expect  to  receive 
and  might  be  obliged  to  give. 

*  Based  on  facts  and  figures  given  in  Barber:  Historical  Collections  of  Massa- 
chusetts, pp.  32-634  (scattered  throughout  the  book). 


208 


APPENDICES 


The  Barber  Statistics  (continued) 


Date  1837 
Town 

Hampshire  County 

Enfield 

Ware   

Middlesex  Coctnty 

Bediord 

Billerica 

Burlington 

Cambridge 

Dracut 

Framingham 

HoUiston 

Hopkinton 

Lexington   

Lowell   

Maiden    

Marlborough 

Natick 

Pepperell 

Reading 

Sherburne   

S.  Reading 

Stoneham    

Stow 

Waltham 

Wayland   

W.  Cambridge   . . . 

Weston 

Wobum 

Norfolk  County 

Bellingham   

Braintree 

Dedham 

Medway 

Needham 

Quincy 

Randolph 

Stoughton  

Weymouth    

Wrentham 


Pop. 


Pr.  Shoes 


Pr.  Boots 


Value 


Males 


Females 


1,058 


858 
1,498 

522 

7.631 
1,898 
2,881 

1,775 

2,166 

1,622 

18,010 

2,303 
2,089 
1,221 
1,586 
2,144 
1,037 
1,488 

932 
1,734 
2,287 

931 

1,051 
2,643 

1,159 
2,237 
3,532 
2,050 
1,492 

3,049 
3,041 
1,993 
3,387 
2,817 


61,623 


90,000 

19,336 

5,800 

13,600 

34,955 

244,578 

15,600 

12,350 
155,800 
103,000 
250,650 

30,000 
290,511 

48,000 
175,000 
ladies 
380,100 

61,044 

29,666 

31,000 

17,182 

279,804 

220 
71,117 
18,722 

100,650 
22,673 
18,603 

470,620 
53,250 

242,083 
150 


867 


512 


700 

1,524 
20,803 
72,300 

3,450 
250 


100 

707 
40 


537 

230 

500 

5,606 

800 

14,570 
65,604 

7,175 
38,494 

27,437 

200,175 

174,800 

70,155 

10,155 


11,729 
53,164 


50,000 

",093 
4,900 

28,768 
12,000 

34,293 
241,626 
152,300 

12,278 

27,240 
118,410 

41,200 
213,052 

25,000 

184,583 

40,000 

142,000 

184,717 
18,905 

17,787 
22,419 
25,500 

221,251 

28,077 
202,363 

32,483 
149,774 

14,964 
111,881 

944,715 

487,390 

427,679 

18,675 


60 

12 
73 


312 

234 

51 

24 

263 
30 

338 
60 

260 

297 
32 


383 


357 

198 

26 

163 

804 

495 
828 


80 
9 


149 
24 

19 
no 

189 
15 

494 
30 

186 

180 
30 


320 


265 

98 

41 

58 

671 

386 

519 


APPENDICES 


209 


The  Barber  Statistics  {continued) 


Date  1837 
Town 


Pop. 


Pr.  Shoes 


Pr.  Boots 


Value 


Males 


Females 


Plymouth  County 

Abington 

Bridgewater    

Duxbury   

E.  Bridgewater  . . . 

Halifax 

Hanover 

Hanson    

Hingham 

Middleboro 

N.  Bridgewater  . . . 
W.  Bridgewater  . . 

Suffolk  County 
Boston 

Worcester  County 

Athol  

Bolton  

Boylston   

BrookJSeld 

Chariton 

Dudley 

Fitchburg    

Grafton  

Hardwick 

Harvard 

Hubbardston 

Mendon 

Millbury   

Milford    

Northborough  . . . . 

Northbridge    

N.  Brookfield   

Oxford  

Paxton 

Princeton 

Rutland 

Shrewsbury 

Southborough  . . . . 
Southbridge 


3,057 
2,092 
2,789 
1,926 
781 

1,435 
1,058 
3,445 
5,005 
2,701 

1,14s 


1,603 
1, 68s 

821 

2,514 
2,469 

1,415 

2,910 
1,818 
1,789 
1,780 
3,657 
2,153 
1,637 
1,224 
1,409 

1,509 
2,047 
619 
1,267 
1,265 
1,507 
1,113 
1,740 


526,208 
53,800 

42,334 
263,000 
30,600 
12,000 
48,000 

5,654 
shoes  & 
22,300 
27,890 


24,626 


38,333 
20,700 

17,535 

182,400 

15,500 

27,740 

no  shoe 

671,558 

5, 000 

10,000 

1,100 

150 

80,500 

20,800 

53,500 

559,900 

33,522 

50,000 
5,950 
93,101 
39,312 
15,475 


98,081 

3,124 

1,000 

15,100 


26,064 
boots  not 
79,000 
2,518 


15,047 


16,312 

100 

1,300 

17,244 


return 
18,672 

5,800 

5,300 

22,225 

9,800 

128,000 

7,25s 

600 

24,170 

4,165 
24,200 
10,304 
10,304 

170 
590 


746,794 
57,317 
56,917 

277,800 

27,540 
10,500 
40,000 

55,967 
given 
184,200 
31,200 


102,641 


58,741 
6,250 
20,000 
190,697 
13,700 
22,698 

614,141 
14,500 
20,500 
14,562 
39,800 

93,175 

212,200 

31,720 

50,000 

470,316 

36,794 
48,430 
20,000 

23,369 
88,993 
31,560 
15,712 


847 
150 

61 
270 

40 

35 
180 

71 

750 
43 


304 


79 

27 

34 

262 

27 

26 

906 
20 


61 
150 
305 

SO 

75 
550 

66 

Si 

37 

140 

80 

17 


470 
S6 
60 

144 

26 

240 

SI 

37S 
25 


55 


37 

13 

6 

21S 
78 
18 

486 
8 


6 
63 
37 

25 

20 

300 

45 

9 

13 
109 

75 
14 


2IO 


APPENDICES 


The  Barber  Statistics  {continued) 


Date  1837 
Town 


Pop. 


Pr.  Shoes 


Pr.  BooU 


Value 


Males 


Females 


Worcester  County 

Spencer   

Sturbridge 

Sutton   

Templeton 

Upton 

Westborough 

Worcester   

Essex  County 

Andover 

Beverly   

Boxford  

Bradford   

Danvers 

Haverhill 

Lynn    

Lynnfield 

Marblehead 

Methuen   

Middleton 

Newburyport    .... 

Rowley 

Salisbury 

Saugus  

Topsfield  


2,08s 
2,004 

2,457 
1,690 

1,451 
1,612 

7,117 


3,878 

4,609 

964 

2,275 
4,804 
4,726 

9,323 
674 

5,549 

2,463 

671 

6,741 
1,203 

2,67s 
1,123 
1,049 


2,940 

12,660 

51,968 

9,280 

3,500 

120,656 

27,075 


59,091 
2,220 

9,314 

8,530 

117,699 

20,092 

18,697 


360,000 

6is,ooo 

1,387,118 

2,543,929 

54,000 

1,025,824 

211,300 

500 

300,250 

65,500 

190,326 

124,396 


14,000 

12,003 

2,220 

100 

97 

300 
32,600 

900 


106,496 
18,306 
55,<^56 
22,327 
107,796 
148,774 
59,320 


46,500 
60,000 
52,975 

435,900 

1,005,424 

1,689,793 

40,250 

367,780 

159,225 
1,500 

113,173 
315,360 
40,800 
149,847 
198,676 


162 

35 
103 

156 

360 

89 


666 

1715 
2631 

93 
503 
190 

206 

87 
269 
272 


28 
15 
99 

81 

214 

Z3 


411 
1 1 70 

2554 
80 

655 
167 

114 

48 
114 
269 


Summary  of  facts  from  Barber  ^  about  other  industries  which  com- 
peted with  the  manufacture  of  boots  and  shoes. 

All  Cape  Towns,  i.e.,  in  Barnstable  and  Dukes  Counties,  were  de- 
voted to  fishing,  shipping  and  salt  making. 

In  Berkshire  County,  where  the  climate  was  adapted  to  grazing  and 
the  water  power  made  manufacturing  possible,  the  efforts  and  capital 
of  nearly  every  town  went  i:ito  raising  Merino  and  Saxony  sheep  or 
into  woolen,  cotton  and  paper  mills. 

In  Bristol  County,  where  water  power  and  coast  line  were  abundant, 
the  whale  fishery,  shipbuilding,  and  shipping  was  supplemented  by  the 
manufacture  of  iron  and  tools,  cotton  and  straw  hats. 

'  Facts  given  in  Barber:  Historical  Collections  of  Massachusetts,  pp.  32-634. 


APPENDICES  211 

In  Plymouth  County,  its  eastern  neighbor,  where  there  was  also  a  long 
coast  line,  the  soil  was  sandy  and  unproductive.  The  coast  towns  even, 
divided  their  labor  and  capital  between  sea  pursuits  like  fishing  and 
shipping,  and  boot  and  shoe  manufacture  which  was  the  big  industry 
even  in  1837  of  most  of  its  inland  towns. 

In  Norfolk  County,  on  the  north  of  Bristol  and  Plymouth  Counties, 
there  were  straw  hat  manufactories  and  shovel  making,  as  in  Bristol 
County,  and  intensive  farming  in  the  portion  nearer  Boston,  but  the 
leading  industry  was  like  that  of  its  neighbor,  Plymouth  County,  i.e., 
the  manufacture  of  boots  and  shoes.  In  1837,  5259  persons  engaged  in 
it,  out  of  a  population  of  50,399,  i.e.,  nearly  one-tenth.  Norfolk 
County  was  also  a  tanning  and  currying  neighborhood  just  as  Middle- 
sex and  Essex  Counties  were.  There  seems  to  be  the  same  connection 
between  sheep  raismg  and  woolen  manufacture  in  the  western  coun- 
ties and  between  tanneries  and  shoemaking  in  the  eastern  counties. 
Weymouth,^  in  1837,  beside  making  70,155  pairs  of  boots  and  242,083 
pairs  of  shoes  (to  the  value  of  $427,679),  tanned  and  curried  $42,500  of 
leather. 

Directly  north  in  Middlesex  County,  where  the  "soil  varied"  and  the 
"manufacture  of  cotton  goods  in  1837  was  three  times  the  value  of 
cotton  manufacture  in  any  other  county  of  Massachusetts,"  there 
were  twenty-four  towns  manufacturing  either  boots  or  shoes  or  both. 
Bedford  was  a  "shoe  town"  where  there  were  30  dwellings  and  of  the 
small  population  of  858  people,  60  men  and  80  women  were  at  work  on 
shoes.  Holliston  was  already  known  as  a  shoe  town  and  Hopkinton,  its 
neighbor,  a  boot  town,  in  1837.  Reading  had  for  its  "great  staple  and 
settled  business"  the  manufacture  of  ladies'  shoes.  Two  hundred  and 
fifty  out  of  400  males  in  the  town  were  engaged  in  it.  Maiden  had  not 
only  a  relatively  and  absolutely  large  shoe  business  for  its  size,  but  had 
also  five  establishments  for  currying  leather  —  doing  28,500  sides  in 
1837.  Woburn  also  had  for  its  chief  industries  the  manufacture  of 
boots  and  shoes,  and  tanning. 

Waltham  and  Lowell  were  exceptions,  being  then  engaged  mainly  in 
cotton  manufacture.  These  were  balanced  by  the  other  relatively  large 
towns  of  over  2000  population  in  the  country,  like  Framingham, 
Marlborough,    Maiden,   Hopkinton,   Reading   and   Woburn,   which 

^  Brockton  (North  Bridgewater)  is  only  a  seeming  exception  to  this  rule,  when  it 
comes  to  speaking  of  individual  towns.  Brockton  did  not  tan  much  of  any  leather, 
but  was  so  near  to  Weymouth  on  one  side  and  Boston  on  the  other  that  the  gen- 
eral condition  was  the  same. 


212  APPENDICES 

manufactured  boots  and  shoes  in  large  quantities,  though  not  to  the 
extent  of  putting  their  county  of  Middlesex  in  the  list  of  the  first  four, 
Essex,  Worcester,  Plymouth,  and  Norfolk,  in  that  trade. 

In  Essex  County  where  the  soil  was  poor  and  commerce,  fisheries  and 
shipbuilding  were  available  industries  only  for  the  sea  coast  towns,  the 
tanneries  and  the  shoe  business  took  the  lead,  and  invaded  even  such 
seaports  as  Marblehead,  Newburyport  and  Salisbury.  In  many  of  the 
towns  these  latter  industries  were  neighbors  if  not  partners.  In  Dan- 
vers,*  with  its  population  of  4804,  the  output  of  shoes  in  1837  was 
615,000  pairs  of  boots  and  14,000  pairs  of  shoes,  employing  666  men 
and  414  women,  while  it  had  no  men  employed  in  its  28  tanneries. 

Haverhill  and  Lynn,  the  two  largest  shoe  centres,  had  four  and  six 
tanneries  respectively  which  were  good  sized  for  the  times.  Even  a 
relatively  small  town  Hke  Rowley,  with  1203  population,  was  running 
16  tanneries  besides  putting  out  300,250  pairs  of  shoes  and  32,600 
pairs  of  boots  that  year.  A  casual  study  of  the  figures  of  tables  quoted 
above  will  make  the  reader  realize  that  Essex  County  was  leading  in 
the  output  of  boots  and  shoes  in  Massachusetts  in  1837.2 

In  Franklin  County,  where  besides  sheep  raising  for  wool,  and  farm- 
ing, there  was  the  raising  of  large  droves  of  cattle  for  market,  there 
were  boot  and  shoemaking  for  market  in  only  three  towns,  and  no 
signs  of  tanning  on  a  scale  large  enough  to  be  reported.  Palm  leaf  hats 
and  scythes  provided  work  for  domestic  workers  instead  of  boots  and 
shoes. 

Hampden  County  was  like  FrankUn  County  in  natural  resources  and 
in  manufactures.  Only  two  towns  report  manufacture  of  boots  and 
shoes  for  export. 

In  the  length  and  breadth  of  Worcester  County,  however,  where  soil 
was  good  and  farming  was  the  chief  industry,  there  were  30  towns 
and  cities  manufacturing  boots  and  shoes.  North  Brookfield  had  out- 
stripped any  single  town  in  the  state. 

'  Lawrence,  the  largest  modern  leather  manufacturing  town,  was  a  part  of 
Danvers  then,  and  so  was  Peabody. 

^  In  1905,  only  one  city  went  beyond  Lynn  in  the  value  of  its  output  of  boots  and 
shoes.  While  Lynn's  amounted  then  to  $25,952,571,  that  of  Brockton  was  $30,- 
073,014. 


APPENDICES 


213 


XIX 


Pages  from  the  Henry  Wilson  Accounts  ^ 


Henry  Wilson,  Stock 


Brogans  on  Hands  of  Consignees  —  not 
returned. 


1846 

No. 

Size 

Jan.  I 

200  prs. 

8-14  B. 

210  prs. 

9-14  B. 

400  prs. 

7-12  B. 

480  prs. 

6-12  B. 

650  prs. 

6-11  B. 

iioo  prs. 

I-  SB. 

650  prs. 

9-13  B. 

240  prs. 

6-14  B. 

250  prs. 

8-14  R. 

100  prs. 

9-14  R. 

210  prs. 

7-12  R. 

2150  prs. 

6-12  R. 

IIOO  prs. 

6-11  R. 

550  prs. 

I-  sR- 

250  prs. 

9-13  R. 

3180  prs. 

6-14  R. 

200  prs. 

6-11  R. 

350  prs. 

6-11  R. 

100  prs. 

8-14  R. 

1 20  prs. 

6-12  R. 

Selling 
Price 

75c. 

75 
70 
70 
60 
40 
30 
65 
75 
75 
65 
67 
60 
40 
30 
65 
65 
70 
80 
70 


Total 
Receipts 

$150.00 

150.00 

280.00 

336.00 

390.00 

440.00 

195.00 

156.00 

187.50 

75.00 

13500 

1440.50 

690.00 

220.00 

15.00 

2000.00 

130.00 

240.00 

80.00 

84.00 


1846    Stock  of  Brogans  sold  not  settled. 


1846 
Jan. 


No. 
100  prs. 
no  prs. 
300  prs. 

50  prs. 
100  prs. 
200  prs. 
250  prs. 

60  prs. 
450  prs. 
480  prs. 
750  prs. 
150  prs. 


Size 


Selling 
Price 


Total 
Receipts 

$75.00 

217.50 

25.00 

60.00 
170.00 
192.00 

42.00 
326.25 
348.00 
490.00 

90.00 
418.00 


'  This  account  book  is  owned  by  Mr.  Louis  Coolidge,  the  Treasurer  of  the 
United  Shoe  Machinery  Company  and  a  direct  descendant  of  Mr.  Wilson. 


214 


APPENDICES 


1846    Stock  of  Brogans  on  hand  unsold. 


Jan.  I 


Jan.  I 


Jan. 


Jan.  I 


Jan.  s 


150  prs. 

9-14  B. 

75  c. 

$112.50 

150  prs. 

9-14  B. 

75 

112.50 

360  prs. 

9-14  B. 

70 

252.00 

850  prs. 

6-1 1  R. 

60 

510.00 

1500  prs. 

6-11  R. 

65 

975.00 

60  prs. 

6-14  B. 

60 

36.00 

100  prs. 

12-14  B. 

90 

96.00 

Stock 

in  Hands  of  Workmen. 

900  prs. 

6-1 1  R. 

650. 

$585.00 

50  prs. 

9-14  B. 

75 

37-50 

1 20  prs. 

6-24  B. 

60 

72.00 

Stock  on  Hand. 

1000  ft. 

lie. 

$110.00 

2000  ft.  Kipp 

L. 

10 

200.00 

Sole  leather, 

100.00 

Innersole  leather 

50.00 

Welt  Leather 

100.00 

30  doz.  long  (?) 

100.00 

splits 

130.00 

1 1  cases  upper  L. 

100.00 

3  cases  upper  L. 

15.00 

1846 

Real  Estate  on  Hand. 

House 

$1800.00 

Shop 

800.00 

House  lot 

300.00 

House  and  shop 

1300.00 

House  lot 

200.00 

Our  half  house 

500.00 

Personal  Property  on 

Hand. 

Furniture 

$600.00 

Splitting  mill 

50.00 

Horse  and  wagon 

86.00 

Small  bills 

50.00 

Notes  on  Hand 

Notes  and  Bills  to  pay 


Not€s  Given 

Stock 

Notes  in  market 

Bills  not  settled 

Cash  borrowed 


$376576 


$9780.00 

9780.00 

4300.00 

3362.00 

265.00 


APPENDICES 


215 


1846        Dr. 


Mar.    7 
Mar.  13 


To  250  pr. 
To  250  pr. 


Some  Individual  Accounts 
W.  A.  Ransom, 


Cr. 


6-11 
6-1 1 


67c. 
67  c. 


$167.50 
167.50 

335-00 


By  note 


JI5-49 
19-51 


33S-00 


1846        Dr. 


E.  P.  Santord, 


Cr. 


Feb.  23 
28 

To  100  pr. 
To  250  pr. 
To  250  pr. 
To    50  pr. 

8-1 1 
6-1 1 
6-1 1 

8-12 

87§c. 
65IC. 
65^  c. 
775C. 

Apr. 

10  By  cash    $442-75 

442.7s 

1845        Dr.  J.  F.  CoLLATH,                                    Cr. 

Oct.    16    To  cash  and  orders  $245.24    Apr.  11  By  Bal.  on  leather 

To  cash  5.00    Oct.  16  By  work  on  Let 

To  cash  5.00        1846 

To  cash  25.00    June  5  By  cutting 


Dec.     3 

1846 
Jan.     I 


To  cash 
To  goods 
To  12N.  F. 
To  cash 


By  Bot.  100  pr.  (3)  17^ 
15.00  By  patterns 

12.23  By  clos.  180  pr  6-14  (3) 

2.40  By  clos.  50  pr.  r.  (4) 

12.00    Apr.  18  By  work 


Apr.  18    To  goods  &  Cash        168.74 


490.61 


$72.74 
227.67 

71.10 

17-50 

3-50 

5 -40 

2.00 

175.00 

574-91 


Apr.  27    To  note 


84.30    Apr.  18  By  balance 


84.30 


2l6 


APPENDICES 


1846        Dr. 

Spears 

AND  VaNDERHOOF, 

( 

Cr. 

Feb.  23 

To  ISO  pr. 

6-11 

672  c. 

To    50  pr. 

8-13 

80 

Mar.  23, 

Feb.  28 

To    so  pr- 
To  200  pr. 

8-13 
6-1 1 

80 
70 

By  note 

$615.00 

Mar.    3 

To  150  pr. 
To    50  pr. 
To    50  pr. 

6-11 
8-13 
8-13 

67I 

80 

82i 

12 

To    so  pr. 
To  100  pr. 

8-13 
6-1 1 

82§ 

70 

$615.00 

These  brogans  were  shipped  in  boxes  ^  —  no  longer  in  casks  or 
trunks,  as  in  the  pioneer  days  of  trade. 


1844       Dr. 

Oct.    1 7  To  cash 

June  26  To  cash 

1846 

Jan.     I  To  cash 


Oilman  Moore, 
$180.34        Oct.   17    By  boxes 


Cr. 


150.00 


141.09 


June  10      "       " 

1846  by  balance 
Jan.     I     By  boxes 


July     I    To  cash 

92.07        June  II 

«         a 

July     I 

a         St 

1846        Dr. 

Priest  and  Co. 

June    I     To  cash 

$20.00        June    I 
6.00 

by  boxes 

Cr. 


$180.34 

156-36 

6.36 

134-73 

84.27 
7.80 

92.07 
$26.00 


Evidently  the  boxes  of  brogans  were  shipped  by  freight  on  the  new 
Worcester  Railroad. 


184s 

Dr. 

Worcester  Railroad  Corporation, 

Cr. 

May 

3 

To  cash 

$13-00 

May    3    By  balance 

$18.89 

6 

u        u 

5-89 

June    3     By  Bill 

16.04 

June 

3 

a        u 
u        u 

10.00 
6.04 

Apr. 

22 

To  cash 

14.62 

Apr.   20    By  balance 

14.62 

May 

5 

To  cash 

4-53 

May     5     By  Bal. 

4-53 

June 

9 

To  cash 

3301 

By  carting 

33-01 

*  Compare  with  use  of  boxes  in  Lynn. 


APPENDICES  217 

Prices  paid  for  work,  and  the  fact  that  pay  was  sometimes  given  in 
orders  on  local  stores,  are  shown  in  pages  like  the  following: 

1845        Dr.  Martin  Haynes,  Cr. 

June    3    TogoodsatC&W  $100.00        Oct.  By  clos.  to  date         $124.35 

Oct.   16      "       «     «   «  «    «       50.CXD  14      "     "     and  work         30.00 


To  goods  150.00                                                             154-35 

4-35 

1845        Dr.  Mrs.  A.  Davis                                   Cr. 

June    3    To  order  on  Settlement  $6.50        June     3    By  work  on  leather       $6.50 

1845        Dr.  Mrs.  Gowan                                   Cr. 

Oct.   23    To  orders  and  cash  $124.00        Oct.  23      By  work  to  date        $124.00 

Sometimes  workers  were  paid  partly  in  lasts.^ 

1845        Dr.  L.  D.  Moody,                                 Cr. 

Oct.    24    To  12  lasts  $2.16        Oct.    24    By  pr.  Brogs.  $12        $19.10 

Dec.     4    To  cash  19.20                         By  work                           2.16 

1845       Dr.  John  O.  Wilson                               Cr. 

Oct.    24    To  4  lasts  .72        Oct.    24    By  Bott.  loopr.  12  ^    $12.00 

«   4R.« 
Apr.   20    To  cash 
30    To  cash 
To  20  lasts 

(20)  4.00 
To  I  barrel 

flour  6.62 

To  cash  5.00 


.84 

24 

25.00 

1846 

20.00 

Jan.  5 

62.18        May    5 


To  amt.  for.  192.22 


u 

a 

240  " 

13, 

31.20 

u 

a 

50  pr. 

14 

7.00 

a 

a 

100  pr. 

loR 

10.00 

a 

u 

50  " 

14  « 

7.20 

u 

a 

250  " 

17" 

42.50 

a 

a 

850  " 

17" 

144-50 

25440 

62.18 

May  II     By  balance  192.22 


*  This  buying  of  lasts  by  domestic  shoemakers,  from  Henry  Wilson  as  manufac- 
turer, suggests  that  he  was  getting  them  made  at  a  wholesale  reduction.  The  same 
thing  was  being  done  at  Howard  and  French's  factory  in  Randolph. 

^  These  figures  are  prices  in  cents,  representing  price  paid  per  pair  for  bottoming. 
Evidently  these  brogans  were  roughly  and  quickly  pegged,  and  at  the  lowest  cus- 
tomary price.  The  price  Wilson  paid  for  closing  uppers  was  3  or  4  cents  a  pair, 
Mr.  Isaac  Felch  has  told  me  that  the  rate  for  bottoming  brogans  ran  from  18  to  22 
cents  a  pair,  and  4  cents  a  pair  for  closing  the  uppers.  The  machine  can  do  all  this 
work  today  for  9  to  11  cents  a  pair. 


2l8 

APPENDICES 

184s 

Dr. 

Alonzo  Nute 

Cr. 

Oct. 

24 

To  33  lasts 

$6.12 

Oct. 

24 

By  Bott.  350  pr.  B  ^  14 

$49.00 

Nov. 

20 

To  cash 

100.00 

By     "      720  pr.  R    13 

93-60 

To  12  qt.  pegs 

.48 

By     "      150  pr.  R    12' 

'  18.00 

To  cash 

6.00 

By     "        5opr.  R    12 

6.00 

To  14  R.  lasts  goods 

By     "      300  pr.  R    13 
By     "      no  pr.  B.   14 

39-00 

15-40 

I 

To  rash 

147.91 
181.47 

Apr 

I 

By    "      150  pr.  R    17 

25-50 

Apr. 

By  work 

329-38 

329-38 

184s 

Dr. 

H.W.: 

Hammond 

Cr. 

Oct. 

24 

To  lasts 

3-42 

Oct. 

24 

By  work  to  date 

85.00 

Dec. 

8 

To  cash 

50.00 

1846 

To  4  lasts  (18) 

.80 

Jan. 

S 

By  100  pr.  B.  8-14  (15) 

15-00 

1846 

By    25  pr.  B.6-11  (13) 

32.50 

Jan. 

IS 

To  bill  to  note 

65.00 

By  360  pr.B.  6-12  (14) 

50.40 

To  cash 

60.00 

May 

5 

"     "     "   «    6-12(14) 

50.40 

To  cash 

50.00 

"     Sopr.R.17 

8.50 

To  order 

25.00 

By  work 

83-45 

254.22 

325-25 

May 

S 

To  balance 

73-53 

By  work 

2.50 

327-75  327-75 

This  year's  business  alone  was  interesting  enough  to  make  students 
of  industrial  history  glad  that  by  happy  chance  the  account  book 
chronicling  it  was  saved.  It  is  so  like  hundreds  of  other  cases  in  Massa- 
chusetts, however,  that  it  would  have  not  warranted  the  interest  taken 
in  Henry  Wilson's  "ten-foot  factory"  by  thousands  of  tourists  and 
poUticians,  if  he  had  not  been  known  later  as  the  "  Shoemaker- Vice 
President." 

*  R.  is  russet.    B.  is  black.  »  Twelve  is  12  cents  a  pair. 


APPENDICES 


XX 


219 


Excerpts  from  the  Robinson  &  Co.  Papers^ 
Notes  and  Bills  received  in  and  after  Sept.  1848 


Date 

From 

On  wh. 

Time 

When  due 

Amt. 

Remarks 

1848 

acct. 

June    3 

Down  &  Ball 

Mdse 

6  mos. 

Dec.  3/6 

117.77 

Sent  for  Disc.  Oct.  lotb 

May  29 

D.  B.  Trufant 

Leather 

4  mos. 

Sept.  29 

113.48 

Sent  to  Warren  Bk. 
for  collection 

Aug.  IS 

Freeman  &  Childs 

Mdse 

4  mos. 

Dec.  IS 

162.12 

Sent  to  Warren  Bk. 
for  collection 

June  21 

Graham  &  Van  Voust 

Mdse 

4  mos. 

Oct.    21 

131-66 

July  IS 

W.  N.  Spinney 

Leather 

6  mos. 

Jan.   13 

168.04 

The  "Account  of  Stock"  book  of  1854  gives  the  following  items  and 
shows  how  many  of  the  machines  so  recently  invented  were  owned  by 
the  firm : 

Accounts  Rec'ble  (amounted  to)  $18,518.74 

Accounts  Payable  "  "    1 1,140.00 

Bills  Rec'ble    9,422.06 

Bills  Payable 8,861.42 

Mdse.  as  follows: 

Manufacturer's  Stock    1,686.50 

Leather 4,723-35 

Trimmings 257.00 

Machine  and  fixtures,  as  follows: 954-o6 

I  sole  cutting  machine  $1 20.00 

I  pr.  scales  20.00 

I  safe 127.81 

1  desk   30.00 

I  splittng  machine  50.00 

I  stripping  machine 55-oo 

I  Nichols  &  Bliss  sewing  machine   125.00 

I  Hunts  "  «         65.00 

I  Howes  "  "         50.00 

I  Punching  "  4.00 

I  stove  "  5.00 

coal  on  hand 25.00 

lasts  &  patterns 250.00 

7  stools 5.25 

basket  &  duster   4.00 

clock  &  stationery  10.00 

Grindstone 8.00         954.06 

»  Preserved  in  the  archives  of  the  Lynn  Historical  Society. 


220  APPENDICES 

XXI 

Natick  Statistics 

The  Natick  industries  in   1854,  according  to  the  Massachusetts 
Census  of  1855,  were  as  follows:  ^ 

Value  of 
No.  of         No.  persons     Capital         articles 
manufactories      employed      invested        made 

Shoe  Box  Manufactories   2                10      $5,500  $19,100 

Harness  Manufactories 2                  3           500  2,100 

Cap  Manufactories i                  i             25  350 

Carriage  Manufactories  3                10        1,550  5,900 

Pulp  for  paper        "  i                12       16,500  70,425 

Cutlery  Manufactories 3                  3           450  2,000 

Baking  Manufactories   i                  4        1,100  9,iio 

Shoe  filling  Manufactories 2                 3              5°  i>Soo 

Wholesale  custom  cloth  Manufac- 
tories          5                II         5,500  30,800 

Value  of  tree  nails  or  ship  pins  prepared  for  market  4ji36 

Value  of  ship  timber  sold   1,730 

Value  of  ship  plank  sold 260 

Value  of  shoes  and  boots 1,163,808 

No.  of  pairs  of  shoes  made 1,281,295  ^ 

No.  of  boots  made   570 

No.  of  males  employed   i)070 

No.  of  females  employed 497 

The  volume  of  the  Walcott  business  alone  in  Natick  was  as  fol- 
lows : ' 

Year                             Pairs  of  Brogans  Year  Pairs  of  Brogans 

1835 4,050                  1845 40,350 

1836 II  ,000                   1846 64,000 

1837 8,310                  1847 100,010 

1838 9,290                   1848 84,012 

1839 10,350                   1849 107,336 

1840 8,200                   1850 104,222 

1841 18,700                   1851 112,140 

1842 21,830                   1852 118,080 

1843 25,113                   1853 118,140 

1844 36,710                   1854 97,920 

*  Quoted  by  Bacon:  History  of  Natick,  p.  154. 

*  This  is  interesting  because  for  the  last  forty  years  Natick  has  been  known  only 
as  a  boot  town. 

^  Quoted  by  Bacon:  History  of  Natick,  p.  154. 


APPENDICES  221 

XXII 

Excerpts  from  the  Howard  and  French  Accounts^ 
1845 

Jan.   14    Amasa  Clark,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  St.  Calf  Peg'd  boots $25.50 

2  "  calf          "  h  welt  boots  3-75 

2  "          kip    3-25 


I  "  calfW.  P 2.63 


I  "         Kip     "       2.25 

I  «         Calf  sewed 2.75      $40-13 

Feb.     8 

To  12  pr.  Kip  pegged  boots 22.50 

12  "    calf       "  "      27.80      $50,30 

Feb.  14 

To    I  pr.  St.  Calf  Pegged  Boots $2.50 

Feb.  19 

To  12  pr.  St.  Calf  Pegged      "        26.50 

Feb.  22 

To  12  pr.  St.    "        "  "      25.50 

6  "  "     sewed       "      iQ-So'' 

Mar.  II     12  pr.  Goat  10/6  ^   21.00 

12  "    light  Calf 24.00 

12  "    St.  Calf 3300 

Mar.  17    Amasa  Clark,  Cr. 

By  cash  10  dollars  10.00 

Mar.  18  24  pr.  St.  Calf  Pegged  Boots-wide   11/9        47-oo 


12 


«     «       «  «  «         «      12/-        24.00 


12"    St.  Goat  Boots  12/9        25.50 

12  "     "       "         "       12/-         24.00 

Mar.  28    To  1 2  pr.  St.  Calf.  Peg'd  boots  12/9        25.50 

12  "  "         "  "     wide     24.00 

12"  "      sewed   37-5° 

Apr.     I       12  pr.  Goat  Peg'd  Boots  (wide) 24.00 

12  "       "         "      Best..... 25.50 

12^    ^W.  wide    21.00 

'  These  Howard  and  French  account  books  are  in  the  possession  of  the  author. 
2  Note  difference  in  price  between  pegged  and  sewed  boots  of  same  stock,  $25.50 
against  $39.00  a  dozen  pairs. 
'  10/6  means  sizes  10  to  6. 


222  APPENDICES 


Amasa  Clark's  Sales  Larger  in  Fall  of  that  same  Year,  1845. 

Sept.  12    To  12  pr.  Calf.  Sewed  Boots  (B.  I.  &  Co.)   $30.00 

48  "    St.  Calt.  Pegged  Boots 103.00 

36  "     "       "      sewed  100.50 

36  "     "       "  "       88.56 

36  "     "       "      Grd ' 76.50 

12  "     "       "        "      DS.  Pegged 27.00 

12  "     "      "        "        "         "      W.  P 30.00 

12  "     "       "      Nap 27.00 

12"     "       "        "      D.0 27.60    $510.16 

Sept.  23    To  12  pr.  Calf  Pegged  |  W  ^   25.50 

«    «      «         "       "  25.50        si.oo 

Sept.  26    To  12  pr.  Kip  ^  Pegged  W.  P.'*  Boots  12/9   25.50 

12  "      "  "  "      10/6   21.00 

8  "    Calf        "  "      15/      20.00 

7  "    St.  "       "  "      12/9    14.88 

3  "    Boys       "      thick         "       8/      4-oo 

6  "    ChU.        "  "  "        6/6   5-So        90.88 


Clark  collected  payment  in  form  of  notes  and  sometimes  cash  from 
the  customers;   the  following  entries  credit  him  for  it: 

1845    Amasa  Clark,  Cr. 

Sept.  26    By  J.  Richardson     note  Apr.     i,  6  mos $269.00 

D.  &  Bushwell      "     Apr.  15,  6  mos 192.55 

D.  &  H.  Dixey,     "     Mar.    8,  3  mos 50.00 

Cash                                                        168.45 

Total  680.00 

May  22     A.  Clark  Cr.     By  Cash 125.00 

Jan.    16,  1846    Amasa  Clark,  Cr. 

By  T.  Foss  Note  Jan.  10,  6  mos 141.00 

J.  J.  Ashby,  Bal.  on  note 34-50 

John  Perly  Note  Jan.  15,  6  Mos 200.50 

Cash  Two  Hundred  Fifty  dollars  250.00 

Discount  on  J.  Richardson  Apr 4.00 

"           "   "  Kip  boots 1.50 

«   «  calf     25 

Premium  on  H.  E.  S.  &  CO.  goods 11.00      642.75 

>  Grained.  '  Kip  —  old  calf . 

2  1/2  welt.  *  W.  P.  means  water  proof. 


APPENDICES  223 

Customers  and  Sales. 

184s 

Jan.    13I   Wm.  Dyke,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Men's  Kip  W.  P.  pegged  boots  $22.50 

Amasa  Clark,  Dr. 

To  19  pr.  boots 40.13 

Jan.    14    George  V.  Edney 

To    6  pr.  St.  Calf  Pegged  boots  9,  10,  14/ 14.00 

6  "     "    Kip       «  "     «         12/ 12.00 

Jan.    15    O.  Ames 

To    8  prs.  Mens  Thk  Sewed  Boots 17-33 

Jan.    18    Caleb  S.  Small,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Boys  Thick  pegged  Boots $17.00 

12  «    Youths"  "  «      13.20        30.20 

Jan.    22.   Joseph  Crocker,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Calf  Top  Soled  Boots    28.50 

Jan.   31     Rufus  Wade,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  M.  Calf  Sewed   Boots 36.00 

12  "     "       "    Pegged      "      ^W 27.00 

12  "    St.    "         "  "         27.00        90.00 

Feb.     8     Amasa  Clark,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Kip  Pegged  boots 22.50 

"    12   "    Calf       "  "       27.80        50.30 


William  Dyke,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Mens  Kip  Pegged  W.  P.  Boots  25.00 

E.  Holden,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Mens  Calf  Sewed  Boots    31.50 

D.  W.  Wisell,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Mens  Calf  Peg'd  W.  P.  Boots  28.50=2 

Feb.  12    T.  P.  Edney,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  St.  Calf  Peg'd  boots 27.00 

Feb.   14    Wm.  H.  Learned,  Dr. 

To  7  pr.  Men's  kip  peg'd  W.  P.  Boots 14.58 

Feb.  15    D.  O.  Donnell,  Dr. 

To  50  pr.  Boys  Kip  Brogans  37-50 

Feb.  18    George  P.  Smith,  Dr. 

To  25  pr.  Mens  Kip  Brogans $   90        22.50 

Feb.  19    Amasa  Clark,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  St.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots   26.50 

Rufus  Wade,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  St.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots   27.00 

^  These  dates  were  taken  at  random. 

^  Notice  prices  of  these  boots  compared  with  those  made  for  California  trade 
later. 


224  APPENDICES 

Customers  and  Sales  {continued) 

1845 

Feb.  22     Amasa  Clark,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  St.  Calf  peg'd  Boots  C.  J.  A $25.50 

6  "     "      "    sewed  W.  P.  A.  S.  D 19.50 

Feb.   26    Sam.  Dummond,  Dr. 

To  24  pr.  Mens  Grd.  ^  W.  Boots   $1.65        39.60 

"24"        "      St.  Calf          "       1.87I      45.00 

«    12  "    Boys    "       "            "       1.37I       16.50 

"    1000  yds  Shoe  strings  7.50 

Mar.    3    Rufus  Wade,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Mens  Calf  Peg'd  §  W  Boots 27.00 

Mar.    4    Allman  &  Maxwell,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Mens  Calf  Sewed  Boots    36.00 

"    200  yds.  strings    1.50 

"   12  pr.  Mens  Lt.  Calf  Peg'd 19.50 

«   i2pr.  Grd.  i  W             "       19.50 

Mar.    5    Wm.  Pearman,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Lit.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots 1.87^       22.50 

12  «      "      "         "        20.04 

Mar.    7    Amasa  Clark,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Goat  Peg'd  Boots 24.00 

"    12  pr.  Calf       "  "      24.00 

"    1 2  pr.  Mens  Calf  Sewed  Boots    37-So 

«    i2pr.     "     Gr.        "  "         25.50 

Mar.  II    Levi  Mann,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Lt.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots  22.50 

"    72  "     "    Shoulder   114.00 

"    12  "     "    Seal    18.00 

Amasa  Clark 

To  12  pr.  Grd.  Peg'd  |  W  Boots 21.00 

12"    Lt.  Calf 24.00        45.00 


D.  O.  Donnell,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Mens  Calf  Boots 27.00 

O.  Ames,  Dr. 

To  25  pr.  Mens  Thick  Peg'd  Shoes 25.00 

"    "       28.12        5312 

Mar.  14    Amasa  Clark,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  St.  Calf  Sewed  Boots 3300 

"12"     "       "         "  " 33-00 

Mar.  14    Levi  Mann,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  St.  Calf  Pegged  Boots  1 1/3   22.50 

12  "  Grd.  ^W  "  19.20 


APPENDICES  225 

1845  Customers  and  Sales  {continued) 

Mar.  18    D.  0.  Donnell,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Seal  Peg'd  \  W  Boots  $21.00 

Levi  Mann,  Dr. 

To  36  pr.  Lt.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots  57.00 

Amasa  Clark 

To  24  pr.  St.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots  wide 11/9         4700 

12  "     "       «        "         "         "     12/  24.00 

12  "     "    Goat    "         "       Best 12/9         25.50 

12""      "        "         "  12/  24.00 

Wm.  H.  Learned,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Goat  Peg'd  Boots 11/7         22.50 

Mar.  21     R.  W.  Howes,  Dr. 

To  60  pr.  grd.  §  W  Peg'd  Boots   9/9         97.50 

Mar.  22     G.  P.  Smith,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Boys  Calf  |  W  Boots 10/  20.00 

Mar,  22     D.  O'Donnell,  Dr. 

To  24  pr.  Calf.  Downings 6/  24.00 

Mar.  22     G.  P.  Smith,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Goat  Peg'd  Boots 11/6         23.00 

Mar.  22    Wm.  Dyke,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Goat  Peg'd  Boots 11/6         23.00 

Mar.  24    O.  Ames,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Thick  Peg'd  Brogans 6/  12.00 

Mar.  25     Samuel  Dummond,  Dr. 

To  36  Pr.  St.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots  67.50 

"    1000  yds.  shoe  strings 7.50 

"    12  pr.  Boys  St.  Calf  Peg'd 8/3         16.50 

"    24  «    Youths      "        «       6/9         27.00 

Mar.  28    Rufus  Wade,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  Lt.  Seal  Peg'd  Boots  20.00 

Wm.  Dyke,  Dr. 

To  1 2  pr.  St.  Seal  Peg'd  Boots    18.60 

Mar.  28    Amasa  Clarke,  Dr. 

To  12  pr.  Lt.  Calf  Peg'd  Boots 25.50 

To  12  «     "      "        "         «      wide 24.00 

To  12"     "       "    sewed     "       37.50 

Stock  ^  bought  by  Howard  &  French  from  Jan.  to  March,  1845 

Jan.     4    R,  McConnell  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.2  per  bill   $55.20 

G.  G.  Gove  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 47-78 

*  Stock  was  bought  by  this  as  well  as  other  firms  then,  in  relatively  small  amounts, 
judged  by  standards  of  today.  These  firms  sometimes  sold  in  still  smaller  quantities 
to  shoemaker-customers,  e.g.,  25  or  39  lbs.  of  sole  leather. 

*  Mer.  stands  for  merchandise. 


226  APPENDICES 

Stock  bought  by  Howard  &  French  from  Jan.  to  March,  1845  (contin'd) 

Jan.     4    Hunt  &  Cutter  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill $64.00 

Wm.  Mitchell  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 48.03 

W.  &  J.  Guild,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 26.09 

Jan.    II     R.  McConnell  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 39.12 

Nath.  Faxon  >  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 69.33 

A.  Thompson  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill S4-ii 

J.  Nichols,  Cr. 

By  153  3/4  ft.  wax  leather $13  19.98 

34J       "    split      "       30  10-27 

120         "    Kip        "       12  14.40 

Jan.    18    J.  Nichols,  Cr. 

By  I  doz.  Calf  skins  425  to  3/9 26.56 

I  roll  splits  33  to  30    9.90 

Tillson  &  Mitchell,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 26.26 

Jan.   18    S.  &  J.  Guild,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill S^Si 

R.  M.  McConnell  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  4  doz.  calf  skins  76  to  60 45-6o 

Proctor  &  Kendall,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill IS400 

Jan.    25    J.  Nichols,  Cr. 

By  156^  ft.  Wax  leather 20.32 

Feb.  15  By  iss    "       "         "       20.15 

"    126    "    Kip  13-86 

"     41    "    Calf  25.62 

N.  Faxon  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  Bill 83.32 

Feb.  IS    G.  G.  Gove  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 67.57 

Feb.  17    J.  W.  Harris  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  25  pr.  Kip  Peg.  Brogans  * 20.83 

Feb.   22     N.  Faxon  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  sole  leather  per  bill  24.96 

*  This  firm  of  Nathaniel  Faxon  sold  thread  to  many  manufacturers,  as  various 
ledgers  show. 

'  Howard  &  French  bought  brogans  instead  of  making  them  when  they  had  an 
order  to  fill. 


APPENDICES  227 

Stock  bought  by  Howard  &  French  from  Jan.  to  March,  1845  (contin'd) 

Mar.    I     O.  Ames  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  1 2  doz.  knives  as  per  bill  $10.90 

Mar.  10    A.  Thompson  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 48.34 

N.  Faxon  &  Co.,  Cr, 

By  Mer.  per  Bill 42.00 

R.  McConnell  &  Co.,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bill 81.00 

Hunt  &  Cutler  Co. 

By  2  doz.  Goat  (Skins) $16  32.00 

2  doz.     "            "      g  18.00 

Proctor  &  Kendall,  Cr. 

By  Mer.  per  bUl 141.33 

Piece  Wages  and  Specialties  of  Domestic  Workers 

Andrew  M.  Fritts,  in  1846,  was  both  fitting  and  making  ^  boots  of 
various  grades,  at  a  piece  wage: 
1846 

Jan.    13     12  pr.  calf  boots  fitted  &  made $11.50 

23  12  "      «        "         «      "       «      11.50 

Mar.  24     12"      ••'        "Lt2                «      5.25 

Apr.     2     12"      "        «    «    «     «       «     extra 4.50 

May    4     12  "      "        "    "    "     "       "      4.50 

19     12  "      "        "    «    "      "       «      4.50 

26     12  «      «        «    «    "      «       «      4.50 

28     12"      "    Boys  maker 4.25 

June    8     12  "      "       "         «       4.25 

912"      "    Goat 4.25 

17     12"      "    Calf  fitted  and  made 5.75 

24  12  "      "    goat  made  (boy) 4.25 

26  12  "      «    Calf 5.75 

July     3     12  "      "    wide  Lt.  Calf  (boy)    5.00 

24     12"      "    Kip  W.  P.' made 5.50 

28     12"      "    Lt.  fitted  &  made 5.50 

31     12  "      "     "        "      "       "      6.50 

Aug.  II     12  «      "     "        "     «       «      6.50 

II     12"      «     "    KipW.  P.  made    5.50 

22     12"      "     "    Lt.  Calf 6.50 

27  12"      "     "    Kip.  W.  P 5.50 

1  Probably  his  wife  did  the  fitting,  but  it  was  credited  to  and  settled  for  with  him. 
^  Lt.  —  Light  weight  calf. 
3  W.  P.  —  Waterproof. 


228  APPENDICES 

Daniel  Wilde  was  making  the  same  kind  of  pegged  boots  at  a  uni- 
form price.    He  was  credited  on 

1847 

Apr.     I     By  12  pr.  pg.  Boot  made $6.50 

May  10      "12"     "       "         "      6.50 

20      "    12  "     "       "         "      6.50 

24  "    12  "     "       "         "      6.50 

and  so  on  until  September.  This  does  not  represent  his  full  working 
time,  probably,  but  all  the  time  devoted  to  his  work  for  the  Howard  & 
French  firm. 

The  account  of  William  Stetson  shows  still  other  kinds  of  boots  being 
put  on  the  market  by  Howard  &  French.  He  was  credited 

1845 

Oct.     3     By  12  pr.  grd.'  D.  S $6.00 

11  "12"    Thick 480 

20      "    12  "        «      4-8o 

25  "    12  "        "      4-8o 

Nov.  10      "12  "    long  Grd  6.00 

22      "12  "    thick    4-5° 

Dec.     I      "    12  "       "       4SO 

"      I  "    Long   5°^ 

These  accounts  have  not  only  suggested  piece  wages  for  different 
kinds  of  work,  but  the  variety  the  firm  was  making.  Sizes  began  to  be 
carefully  noted  in  the  accounts  for  1847. 

Adoniram  J.  Dyer,  in  1847,  was  credited 

Jan.    15  By  1 2  pr.  Boots  made 5/-  $10.00 

30  "    1 2  pr.      "  "  S/-  10.00 

Feb.   13  "    13  «        "         "  5/  &  6/     11.00 

Mar.    4  "    12  "        "  "  5/  10.00 

4      "      3   "        "  "       6/s  300 

.24      "      I  "        "  "      S/  i.oo 

Apr.     I      "    12  «        "  «      S/-  10.00 

12  "      7  "        "  "      6.00 

30      "    12  "        "         "      5/  10.00 

This  price  for  making  was  so  much  higher  that  it  shows  better  work 
in  higher  grade  boots.    Perhaps  they  were  hand- sewed  instead  of 

*  Grd.  —  Grained. 

*  Fifty  cents  was  the  price  for  "making"  long  boots,  presumably  because  they 
were  more  awkward  to  handle. 


APPENDICES  229 

pegged,  although  the  account  does  not  say  so.    In  the  case  of  Ben- 
jamin Dyer,  whose  account  follows,  this  fact  is  mentioned: 

1847 

Jan.    22  By  1 2  pr.  Calf  Sewed 4/5  $9.00 

Feb.     6      "    12  "       "         "      4/6  Q.cxD 

Mar.    4      "    12  "       "         "      4/S  9.00 

8      «    12  "       "         "      "  9.00 

24      "    12  "       "         "      «  9.00 

and  so  on  down  to  January,  when  the  bill  due  Benjamin  Dyer  was 
$180.00. 

Women's  Wages  as  Domestic  Workers  on  Boots 

Mrs.  Ira  Howard 
1854    Mrs.  Ira  Howard,  Cr. 

July   22     102  doz.  topt $1.26 

4      "     corded 80 » 

Aug     5     28      "     topt 3.36 

11  "     corded 2.20 

12       8      "     topt 96  2 

8  "     corded 1.60 

19      5  "          "       i.oo 

17  "     topt 2.04 

26     13  "        "     1.56 

Sept.    2     IS  "        "     1.80 

9  "     corded i  .80 

30     70  "     topt 8.40 

25  "  corded 5.00 

Oct.    28    31  "  topt 3.72 

28  "  corded 5.60 

12  "  fitted 1.25  $42.35 


An  opposite  account  shows  that  each  day  Mrs.  Howard  returned  the 
work,  she  was  paid  in  cash  odd  amounts,  not  what  the  work  came  to, 
however,  sometimes  more,  sometimes  less.  It  was  finally  balanced  on 
October  28,  1854. 

Irregular  Amounts  of  Work 

Edwin  Howard,  from  January  7  to  April  8,  1854,  treed  100  pairs  of 
boots  for  $7.00  every  week.  After  that  he  sometimes  went  up  to  108 
pair  or  dropped  to  60  pair  in  the  middle  of  the  summer.  In  1855,  he 
averaged  108  pairs,  week  in  and  week  out. 

•  Twenty  cents  a  dozen,  uniform  price  for  cording. 
^  Twelve  cents  a  dozen,  uniform  price  for  topping. 


230  APPENDICES 

Sylvanus  Pratt's  record  in  1854  had  been  so  irregular  that  one 
wonders  whether  this  irregularity  in  output  was  due  to  Pratt's  speed  or 
to  different  number  of  hours  spent  or  to  the  varying  amounts  of  work 
given  to  him  to  do. 

1854 


Oct. 

28 

216  prs.  treed 

Nov. 

4 

173 

II 

223 

18 

181 

25 

99 

Dec. 

2 

58 

9 

93 

16 

2,S 

108 
118 

1854  Dec. 

30 

108  prs.  treed 

1855  Jan. 

6 

108 

13 

100 

20 

96 

21 

96 

Feb. 

3 

86 

10 

90 

17 

94 

Henry  Bangs,  the  fifth  treer  in  Howard  &  French's  shop,  was  even 
more  irregular  in  amount  of  work  done  a  week,  varying  from  48  to  112 
pairs  a  week. 

xxin 

Excerpts  fbom  the  Gilmore  Accounts,  showing 

Banking  Facilities 
1862 

Oct.     3    H.  Prentiss  &  Co.  Cr. 

By  note  on  6  mos.  from  July  20/62 $665.35 

4    M.  E.  Reeves  &  Co.  ch.  from  Raynham $1,100.68 

E.  A.  Goodnow  «       «  «  262.29 

M.  E.  Dittsman  "       "  «         315.08 

4    Wm.  Claflin  &  Co.  Cr. 

By  check  Reserved  in  store 85.00 

10  C.  C.  Fuller  Reserved  in  Store  Cr. 

By  check 32.25 

Dis.  5  off   1.75        34.00 

11  Potter,  Hitchcock  &  Co.  Cr. 

By  check 109.44 

"   Dis.  5  off   5.76       115.20 

14  M.  E.  Reeves  Check  from  Raynham 1,260. 

Oct.    15     S.  Wilder  Cr. 

By  cash  for  Bank  Goods  42.00 

15  W.  B.  Seaver                                                          Cr. 
By  cash  for  Bank  Goods  

17    A.  P.  Hoover  Cr. 

By  Draft  American  Bk.  U.  S 108.30 

"Dis.  5  off   5.70      114.00 


42.00 


A.  P  PEN  DICES  231 

1862 

Oct.   18    Jane  &  Slanusa 

Ch.  from  Raynham $1,343.06 

18    W.  S.  Lester  Cr. 

By  J.  H.  Lester's  Ch.  for  note $400.00 

18    T.  W.  Howard  &  Bro.  Cr. 

By  Drafts  on  a/c 200.00 

22     H.  A.  Ball 

By  cash 22.80 

"    Dis.  5  ofiF 1.20         24.00 

24    Philip  Ford  &  Co.  Cr. 

By  check 196.89 

"        "     5  off 10.36       207.25 

29  Thos.  Caden  Cr. 

By  draft 287.52 

"    Dis.  5  off 15.13       302.65 

30  Potter,  Hitchcock  &  Co.  Cr. 

By  cash I7S-56 

"    Dis.  5  off 9.24       184.80 

31  E.  A.  Hendry  Draft  from  Raynham 1,102.08 

Nov.    I     Wm.  North  Cr. 

By  draft  on  a/c 800.00 

3     Robert  Morris  &  Co.  Cr. 

By  Note  at  8  mos.  from  Oct.  25/62 1,140.00 

"        "     "  "        "     Nov.  3/62 960.00    2,100.00 

3    Nash  &  Fogg  Cr. 

By  note  at  8  mos.  from  Oct.  10/62 787.95 

g  12/62 790.00    1,577.9s 

6    John  B.  Alley  &  Co.  Cr. 

By  ch 1,500.00 

XXIV 

Excerpts  from  the  Kimball  and  Robinson  Papers/  Brookfield 

Saturday,  December  11,  i8j8 

W.  H.  White,  Cr. 

By    60  pr.  S.  bottd $8.50 

"    120  "    "   Bound 3.10 

Dr.        

To  cash 31-99 

Wm.  Robinson  Dr. 

To  I  Lot  Figans .42 

Nelson  L.  Elmer  Dr. 

To  60  pr.  5  D.  S.  Calf  Boots 13/2  @  70  42.00 

"   60  "    5/10  Childs  Calf  Boots @  40  24.00 

$66.00 


1 


These  account  books  are  owned  by  Mr.  Henry  E.  Twitchell  of  North  Brookfield. 


232  APPENDICES 

Saturday,  December  ii,  1858 
Bigelow  &  Hoagland  Dr. 

To  60  pr.  3/7  Spry  i  Calf  2.82^ $49-5° 

Cyrus  Webber  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.50 

Dr. 

To  cash 2.26 

A.  Ainsworth  Dr. 

To  cash  (Del  Webber)  .67 

Dexter  Henshaw  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.20 

Dr. 

To  thread .06 

Hiram  O.  Newton  Dr. 

To  cash  (Del  Shaw)   23.00 

Dexter  Rice  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.50 

To  cash Dr.  4.39 

G.  W.  Prince  Cr. 

By  180  pr.  S.  Bottd   21.00 

Dr. 

To  cash 25.00 

Ainsworth  &  Hawes  ^  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bottd  (Walker) 6.00 

Wm.  S.  Pike  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.50 

Dr. 

To  cash 2.06 

Henry  H.  Adams  Dr. 

To  thread .05 

Wm.  T.  Lamb  Cr. 

By  120  W.  S.  Bottd  17.00 

By  180  "    S.  Bound 4.80        21.80 

Dr. 

To  cash 23.88 

W.  T.  Lamb  Dr. 

To  cash .12 

Mary  Flagg  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.20 

Dr. 

To  cash 1.20 

'  One  wonders  if  this  was  the  firm  name  of  a  "bottoming  gang."    Walker  b 
evidently  the  name  of  the  man  who  collected  the  money. 


APPENDICES  233 

Saturday,  December  11,  1858 
Charlotte  Howe  Dr. 

To  cash  (on  a.  c.  H.  Howe) %S-ZS 

J.  B.  Bellows  Dr. 

To  order  (A.  H.  Hawes) 5.00 

Ainsworth  &  Hawes  Cr. 

By  J.  B.  Bellows 5.00 

Cash  pd.  for  Can  ?  .75  Book i.oo  1.75 

Augusta  Walker  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.60 

G.  W.  Prince  Dr. 

to  s  lasts  @  IS    .75 

June  27,  i860. 
Mary  Ann  Belcher  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.30 

Geo.  W.  Wellman  Cr. 

By  120  pr.  S.  Botd  16.00 

Dr. 

To  cash 13.00 

Cyrus  Webber  Dr. 

To  cash 5.00 

T.  Barton  Dr. 

To  600  pr.  3/7  L.  L.  Split  (c) 70  420.00 

To  300  pr.  3/7  O.  L.     "        195.00      615.00 

Chancy  Whittemore  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  B.  &  Botd  '   lo.io 

Dr. 

To  cash g.gg, 

Olivet  P.  Kendrick  Dr. 

To  cash 27.00 

A.  Hubbard  Cr. 

By  180  pr.  S.  Bound 2.80 

Dr. 

To  cash 4.30 

Wm.  B.  Cooley  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Botd  8.00 

Dr. 

To  cash 5.00 

Franklin  Sibley  Dr. 

To  cash 25.00 

Henry  Daniels  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Botd  (poor)  2 

1  Shoes  bound  and  bottomed  is  meaning  of  S.B.  &  Botd. 

*  No  amount  given  —  probably  no  pay;  just  the  comment  "poor"  is  set  down. 


234  APPENDICES 

June  27,  i860 

P.  S.  Walker  Dr. 

To  thread $.19 

David  Johnson  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound i  .50 

Braman  Ward  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound .90* 

Samuel  D.  Bowen  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  bound .90 

Dr. 

To  thread .14 

W.  H.  White  Cr. 

By  1 20  pr.  S.  Botd  16.00 

Thomas  Mambee  Dr. 

To  cash .90 

Cr. 
By  60  pr.  S.  Bound .90 

Oliver  P.  Kendrick  Cr. 

By  120  pr.  S.  Botd 12.00^ 

Oliver  P.  Kendrick  Dr. 

To  6  lasts  .84 

G.  A.  Mention  Dr. 

To  2  lasts  .45 

Ruben  Slayton  Cr. 

by  120  pr.  S.  Bound 3.10 

Dr. 
To  thread .12 

Unice  Harrington  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Bound 1.50 

Gardner  Tyler  Cr. 

By  60  pr.  S.  Botd  8.50 

Dr. 

To  cash 8.50 

W.  S.  Cooper  Dr. 

To  cash 10.00 

Adrian  Avery  Cr. 

By  1693^  G.  D.  Sole  Lea @2o^  348.59 

Cartage  .39      348.98 

*  No  reason  appears  for  different  prices  for  same  number  of  shoes  bound. 
^  Note  different  price  for  bottoming  —  $16  for  120  pr.,  $12  for  120  pr. 


APPENDICES  235 

December  14, 1858. 

George  Millard  Dr. 

To    60  pr.  Mens  calf    3/7    ©875           $52.50 

«      "    "        «       Kip   3/7    80              48.00 

«     "   «      "      Split  3/7   72I          43.50 

"   120"    Childs  Calf  5/10 40              48.00    $192.00 

December  18,  1858 

Meade  &  StoweU  Dr, 

To  180  pr.    3/7  Split @70 

"    120  "    11/2     «      @55 


January  i,  1859 

Bigelow  &  Hoagland  Dr. 

To  360  pr.  L.  L.  Cf.  Boots  3/7 @95 

«   360  «    C.  L.  Cf       "      3/7 @92^ 

«     48  "         split    "  Mc  3/7 @7o 

120  «         "         "Spg    3/7 ©67^ 

January  17,  1859 

George  MiUard  Dr. 

To  180  pr.  Mns     Calf  3/7     92^ 

«     60  «       «        Kip  3/7      75 

"120"    Childs  Cf     s/io   40 

January  22,  1859  ^ 

Bigelow  &  Hoagland  Dr, 

To    60  pr.  5/8  C.  L.  Cf  boots  C 95^ 

60  "    3/8  L.  L.  Cf     "      C    97^ 

240  "    3/7  "          "       "     C     95 

60  "    3/7  Col.     "       "      C      92^ 

60  «    3/7     «       «.     "   Spds  8s 

January  22, 1859 

W.  W.  Griffith  &  Co.  Dr. 

To  120  pr.  C.  L.  Cf.  Boots             3/7    92^ 

60  «            Kip      «      2d        3/7    @75 

120  "              Cf.       "     Child,  s/io 42^ 

160  "               «        «       Spgs  ^/j^ ^^2 

60  «               «        «       «         5/10 37I 


On  January  31,  there  is  charged  up  "to  Boston"  a  bill  of  $793 
worth  of  boots,  some  with  heels,  others  spgs  {i.e.,  Springheels  ?). 
Evidently  there  was  a  Boston  office  or  retail  store  of  this  firm. 

*  On  January  29,  this  same  firm  ordered  $876  worth  of  boots. 


126.00 

66.00 

192.00 

205.00 

333-00 

336.00 

81.50 

9SS-SO 

166.50 

45.00 

48.00 

259.50 

51.00 

58.50 

228.00 

55.50 

51.00 

444.00 

1 1 1. 00 

45.00 

51.00 

48.00 

22.50 

277.50 

236 


APPENDICES 


XXV 

Excerpts  from  the  Twitchell  Papers  ^ 


Date 
1861 

Binder's  name 

No.  of 

Kinds 

Quality 

Wom.Miss.Chil. 

when 
taken 

C^C 

Clf.  Kip.  Buff.  Split. 

First    Second 

May    7 

H.  Sibley 

500 

u 

u 

Apr.  24 

Wm.  Maynard 

501 

u 

f£ 

"        25 

G.  N.  Barnes 

502 

u 

"     24 

M.  W.  Cowley 

S03 

u 

L.L. 

u 

«     29 

H.  Sibley 

504 

u 

L.  L. 

a 
ft 

May    3 

E.  Davis 

50s 

u 

ii 

££ 

"        4 

D.  Henshaw 

506 

u 

u 

"        4 

W.  W.  Bowen 

507 

it 

u 

u 

«        6 

P.  S.  Walker 

508 

u 

a 

u 

«       6 

W.  Palmer 

S09 

u 

« 

u 

May    4 

D.  Henshaw 

Sio 

li 

a 

u 

«       6 

Chas  Hamilton 

S" 

u 

u 

<c 

u         u 

Geo.  R.  Newton 

512 

a 

a 

tm 

«       10 

P.  Lackey 

513 

« 

u 

U 

4€ 

May  10 

Geo.  R.  Newton 

514 

ii 

u 

«     10 

C.  A.  Chaffee 

51S 

u 

u 

U 

"       9 

A.  Nichols 

S16 

a 

u 

U 

"       9 

M.  A.  Belcher 

517 

a 

u 

U 

-       8 

Wm.  Nichols 

518 

a 

ii 

U 

"       7 

E.  A.  Gay 

S19 

u 

u 

U 

"      10 

C.  Webber 

520 

u 

u 

u 

"     10 

D.  Henshaw 

521 

u 

a 

u 

"      15 

J.  P.  Steams 

522 

ii 

u 

u 

May  10 

S.  Campbell 

523 

u 

a 

u 

ft 

"        lO 

E.  Davis 

524 

ii 

i£ 

"     13 

H.  Sibley 

525 

u 

tc 

u 

"     17 

D.  Coombs 

526 

u 

ii 

u 

"     17 

P.  S.  Walker 

527 

u 

u 

u 

"     17 

P.  Laskey 

528 

"     17 

D.  Johnson 

529 

"     17 

E.  Davis 

530 

«     i8 

D.  Henshaw 

531 

"     21 

H.  Siblev 

532 

«     22 

Wm.  Nichols 

533 

"     22 

Wm.  Maynard 

534 

«        21 

M.  A.  Belcher 

535 

«        21 

C.  Webber 

536 

"     18 

D.  Henshaw 

537 

"     15 

F.  Shaw 

538 

"     13 

B.  Ward 

539 

"     14 

L.  RusseU 

540 

"     IS 

F.  Barnes 

541 

"     17 

M.  Covley 

542 

«     14 

P.  S.  Walker 

543 

"     IS 

E.  A.  Gay 

544 

»  Twitchell  bought  out  Kimball  &  Robinson  in  1861.    These  pages  show  advanced  bookkeeping 
methods. 


APPENDICES 


237 


XXV 

Excerpts  from  the  Twitchell  Papers 


Date 

When 
returned 

Price 
paid 

1861 
when 
taken 

Bottomer's  name 

Kind 

When 
returned 

Price 
paid 

Sold 

Rmrks 

May  13 

1.20 

June    5 

Wm.  B.  Cooley 

June  29 

_ 

"      28 

1.20 

Apr.   29 

G.  W.  Barnes 

May  28 

- 

I      '^ 

1.20 

Apr.   29 

G.  W.  Barnes 

"      13 

6.00 

"       7 

1.30 

"      24 

W.  B.  Cooley 

C 

"        7 

5.00 

May    4 

1.30 

May     7 

W.  B.  Cooley 

June    5 

6.CX3 

May  17 

1.60 

May    4 

G.  P.  Kendrick 

May  16 

-1 

«     10 

1.50 

"      IS 

F.  Shaw 

June     6 

— 

"     18 

1.60 

Oct.    26 

N.  H.  Delane 

Nov.    8 

— 

"       9 

1.60 

May  10 

N.  H.  Delane 

May  24 

_ 

June    6 

1.60 

"      20 

Wm  Palmer 

June    6 

— 

May  10 

1.60 

May  14 

E.  E.  Chapin 

May  25 

— 

"     20 

1.60 

"        6 

Ch.  Hamilton 

May  20 

— 

June    7 

1.60 

«        6 

Geo.  R.  Newton 

June     7 

— 

May  17 

1.60 

Sept.  18 

Ch.  Hamilton 

T.  S. 

Oct.    12 

— 

June  14 

1.60 

May  10 

Geo.  R.  Newton 

June  14 

— 

May  18 

1.60 

«      20 

H.  May 

May  24 

— 

,"     '^ 

1.60 

"      25 

E.  E.  Chapin 

June     I 

— 

May  21 

1.60 

"      24 

H.  May 

«        I 

_ 

June    8 

1.60 

«      22 

A.  Bemis 

"       8 

_ 

May  17 

1.60 

"      25 

F.  Sibley 

"      13 

— 

May  21 

1.60 

"      24 

H.  May 

"        I 

— 

"     18 

1.60 

Oct.    23 

J.  MitcheU 

§? 

Nov.    7 

_ 

«     28 

1.60 

Sept.  14 

N.  H.  Delane 

Sept.    2 

— 

"     24 

1.60 

May  24 

J.  F.  Bemis 

June  29 

— 

Sept.    5 

1.60 

Sept.    6 

N.  H.  Delane 

Sept.  14 

— 

May  21 

1.60 

May  22 

J.  W.  Fittz 

June     I 

_ 

I     ^^ 

1.60 

May  17 

Benj.  Davis 

May  24 

- 

"       25 

1.60 

Oct.      29 

Oct.    26 

H.  May 

E.  E.  Chapin 

^W 

Nov.    7 
"        4 

— 

Oct.   31 

D. Shaw 

iw 

«      18 

_ 

Sept.  26 
^     28 

Geo.  LaveUey 

Oct.     9 

- 

N.  H.  Delane 

"      17 

— 

June     I 

E.  E.  Chapin 

June  12 

— 

Aug.  31 

J.  F.  Bemis 

Sept.  28 

— 

Oct.     4 

E.  E.  Chapin 

Oct.    14 

— 

June     I 

T.  W.  Fitts 

June  25 

— 

Oct.    20 

H.  Mav 

Nov.    7 

_ 

May  25 

N.  H.  Delane 

June     I 

— 

June     7 

F.  Shaw 

Aug.  21 

- 

Oct.    30 

Geo.  R.  Newton 

Nov.  19 

_ 

Oct.      I 

F.  Barnes 

Oct.    14 

_ 

June     7 

F.  Barnes 

Aug.  15 

_ 

Sept.  23 

H.  May 

Oct.      I 

— 

Oct.    18 

E.  E.  Chapin 

Oct.    26 

— 

June     1 

H.May 

June  12 

■" 

1  This  -  is  meant  for  a  ditto  in  the  ledger  and  evidently  stands  for  $6.00,  the  regular  price. 


238 


APPENDICES 


Excerpts  from  the  Twitchell  Papers 


Date 
1864 
when 
taken 

Binder's  name ' 

No.  of 
case 

Kinds 
Clf.  Kip.  Buff.  Split. 

Quality 
First    Second 

Wom.Miss.Chil. 

2 

I 

Cases  Boys    Split 
"      Youths     " 

1  to    5 
9-13 

3 

«      Boys       " 

I   -     5 

4 

I 

"        2d 

I   -  15 
1-5 

I 

«      Youths  2d  « 

9-13 

2 
2 

"      Boys  ist  " 
"       2d" 

I  -     5 

I  -     5 

4 

H          j5t.<; 

I  -     5 

Volume  aistd  Distribution  of  Business,  and  Methods  of 
Transportation  of  Henry  E.  Twitchell 

From  Order  Book,  February  23,  1861  to  Nov.  28,  1865. 


Firm 

Wadsworth  &  Wells  Chicago 
Henderson  &  Co.,  C.  M. 

Chicago 
Fargo  &  Bill,  Chicago 
V.  Barber,  Decatur,  111. 
O.  Rugg,  Bloomington,  111. 
C.  M.  Lee  &  Bro.  Boston 

W.  W.  Griffin  &  Co.,  Toledo, 

Ohio 
Bassett  &  Emmal,  Lexington, 

Ky. 

George  Millard,  North  Adams, 
Mass.  Ranged  from  30c.  to 
950.  a  pair 

Geo.  O.  Catlin,  Leavenworth, 
Kan. 


C.  M.  Henderson  &  Co. 
Chicago 


Dif .  sizes  kinds 
&  prices 
amount 


1861 
date 


Shipi>ed  via 

69  cases  Feb.   23/61    Merchants  Despatch 

_        ((  u  u  u 


L.  S.  &  M.  C.  R.  R. 
Mar.    5/61     Great  West.  Despatch 

«  u  a  u 

Apr.   10- 

Oct.   30/61     ? 

Mar.    8/61    Great  West.  Despatch 

Mar.    4/61     Merchants  Despatch 
care  of  Mr.  Burney 
Cincinnati,  Ohio 

Mar.  28  & 

Aug.  17/61 


3 

u 

3 

it 

2 

u 

24 

u 

6 

u 

5 

a 

22 


22  cases  Aug.  19  &      Great  West.  &  Mich. 
Nov.    5/61     Cent,  line  Send  R.  R. 
(?)  to  Otis  Kimball,  21 
State  St.  for  Bill  Lading 
34  cases  Aug.  15- 

Oct.  28, 1861  L.  S.  &  M.  C. 


>  These  shoes  were  no  longer  put  out  to  bind,  only  to  bottom.     Probably  they  were  stitched  in 
the  factory.     The  same  ledger  was  used,  with  its  old  forms,  even  after  a  new  custom  arose. 


APPENDICES 
Excerpts  from  the  Twitchell  Papers 


239 


Date 

When 

Price 

1864 

Bottomer's  name 

Kind 

When 

Price 

Sold 

Rmrks. 

returned 

paid 

when 
taken 

returned 

paid 

Apr.       I 

G.  R.  Newton 

Apr.    12 

_ 

"        6 

Austin  Nichols 

"      14 

— 

«        6 

Geo.  H.  Levalley 

"      16 

- 

"      12 

Geo.  R  Newton 

"      19 

- 

"      12 

u          u             u 

u         u 

_ 

"      15 

A.  Nichols 

"      14 

B.  F.  Chever 

"   30 

— 

u         u 

u              u 

"  30 

- 

"  15 

Geo  Levalley 

June  13 

From  Order  Book,  February  23 

,  1S61  to  Nov.  2S,  1S65. 

Dif.  sizes  kinds 

&  prices 

1861 

Finn                                    amount 

date                          Shipped  via 

John  Pow 

ell,  Dj 

lyton,  Oh 

io             15  cases  Aug.  17 

Merchants  Despatch 

Nov.    6 
1861  on  6 
mos.  time 
Bassett  &  Emmal,  Lexington,         13  cases  Aug.  17/61    Merchants  Despatch 
Ky. 

from  30  to  70c.         on  6  mos.  time  c/o 
Baldwin  Studwell  &  Fi    N.  Y.         2  cases  Aug.  17/61 

at  90c.         on  6  mos.  time 
D.  Rugg  &  Noyes,  Champaign,        8  cases  Aug.  20  to     Great  West.  Despatch 

111.  Nov.  is/61 

A.  B.  Smith  &  Co.,  Madison,  21  cases  Aug.  27- 

Ind.  Dec.  5, 1865       "      via  Indianapolis 

Miller  &  Parsons,  Cleve-       9  f       4  cases  Sept.  9  &  16  Merchants  Despatch 
land,  Ohio  cas-l5i-6o  /61  time 


as 


cash  note 


Marcy  &  Haynes 
Hartford,  Ct. 

Howes,  Hyatt  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 
A.  &  F.  Reed,  N.  Y. 


from  55- 
[90c. 

15  cases  Sept.  13, 
from  65       Nov.    7  & 
to  92  Dec.     s/6i 

3  cases  Sept.  18/61 

4 
65c.  to  82c. 
N.  L.  Emer,  Greenfield,  Mass.  2  cases  Sept.  19/61 

O.  Rugg,  Bloomington,  111.  5  cases  Sept.  24 

Oct.    17/61 
Rufus  Elmer,  Springfield  15  cases  Sept.  20  & 

Oct.      7/61 
on  6  mos.  time 


Grt.  West.  Despatch 


240 


APPENDICES 


From  Order  Book,  February  23,  1861  to  Nov.  28,  186$. 


Firm 

Mead,  Stowell  &  Co.,  N.  York 


Dif .  sizes  kinds 
&  prices 
amount 


i86i 
date 


31  cases  Nov.  26  & 
Dec.  23/61 
from  67  to  950.  per  pair  on  6  mos.  time 


Shipped  via 

via  New  Haven 


Crowell  &  Childs,  Cleveland, 

Ohio 
Atkins,  Strak  &  White 

Milwaukee 
V.  Barker,  Decatur,  111. 


Dec. 

12/61 

Rugg  &  Noyes,  Champaign,  HI 

5  cases  Jan. 

10 

Geo.  0.  Catlin,  Leavenworth, 

24  cases  Jan. 

10- 

Ky 

Mar. 

28 

John  Powell,  Dayton,  Ohio 

26  cases  Feb. 

13 

M.  P.  Lancaster,  Lexington, 

2  cases  Feb. 

13 

Ky 

send  bill 
to  Ameri- 
can House 
this  week 

Hewett,  Burgest  &  Co., 

13  cases  Feb. 

13  & 

Cleveland,  Ohio 

Apr. 

2 

R.  M.  Pomeroy  &  Co., 

6  cases  Feb. 

13 

Cincinnati,  Ohio 

"Mark  cases  on 

back  e 

Fargo  &  Bill,  Chicago,  111. 


3  cases  Nov.  2/61      Merchants  Despatch 

3  cases  Nov.  27/61     G.  W.  &  D.  &  M. 
on  6  mos.  time  line 

3  cases  Nov.    8  & 

G.  West.  Despatch 
Grt.  West.  Despatch 

G.  W.  &  M.  C.  line 
Merchants  Despatch 
Merchants  Despatch 
c/o  E.  Taylor 
Cincinnati,  Ohio 


Merchants  Despatch 


&  not  strap."   Nett  prices.   Send  R.  R.  receipt 

36  cases  July  14  L.  S.  &  M.  S.  R.  R. 

Send  R.  R.  Receipt  to      Pay  frt.  to  Worcester 
F.  G.  Faxon  Boston  for  &  ch.  F.  &  B.   Ship  to 


bill  lading 


Wor.  to  be  delivered 
to  F.  &  W.  R.  R. 


Hills  &  Goodman,  Hartford, 

2  cases  Feb. 

13 

Co. 

Wells  &  Christie,  N.  Y. 

150  cases  Mar. 

3&8 

Aug. 

20 

R.  &  J.  Cummings,  Toledo, 

II  cases  Feb. 

24  & 

Merchants  Desp. 

Ohio 

July 

14 

V.  Barber,  Decatur,  111 

12  cases  Mar. 

II 

G.  W.  Despatch. 

A.  B.  Smith  &  Co.,  Madison, 

II  cases  Mar. 

4& 

Merchants  Desp. 

Indiana 

Oct. 

II 

via.  Indianapolis 

C.  M.  Lee  &  Bros.  Boston 

38  cases  Apr. 

2  & 

Aug. 

18 

F,  C.  &  D.  WeUs,  Chicago,  lU. 


40  cases  Nov.  5 
May  2,  July  14 
Nov.    4      71  cases 


Merchants  Desp  & 
some  by  L.  S.  &  M.  S. 
R.  R.  Gov.  tax  added 


APPENDICES  241 

From  Order  Book,  February  23,  1861  to  Nov.  28,  1865. 

Dif .  sizes  kinds 

&  prices  1862-3 

Finn  amount  date  Shipped  via 

C.  M.  Henderson  &  Co.,  46  cases  May        7      L.  S.  &  M.  S.  R.  R. 
Chicago,  111.  July  11,  17     Ship  to  Worces.  & 

Sept.  13  some  Merch.  Desp. 

Marcy  &  Haynes,  Hartford,  44  cases  July     3 

Ct. 
Rugg  &  Noyes,  Champaign,  111.     35  cases  July     5  G.  W.  Despatch 

Ship 
Aug.  IS 
John  Powell,  Dayton,  Ohio  25  cases  July     7  &      Merchants  Despatch 

Nov.    5 
Mead,  Stowell  &  Co.,  N.  Y.  45  cases  July   17  &      via  Pate  &  N.  L.  W. 

Oct.    28  R.  R. 

Geo.  O.  Catlin,  Leavenworth,         60  cases  July   19  G.  W.  &  M.  C.  Line. 

Kan. 
O.  Bailey,  White  Cloud,  Ka.  9  cases  July   26  Grt.  West.  Despatch 

Send  R.  R.  receipt  to       via  Worces.  &  Prov. 
Peter  Mclntyre,  &  Co.    R.  R. 
Boston 

Huett,  Burgest  &  Co.,  9  cases  July                Merchants  Desp. 

Cleveland,  Ohio 

V.  Barber,  Decatur,  111.  143              Mar.  14,  1862         "             " 

W.  W.  Cane,  Greenfield,  Mass.  3  cases  ? 

O.  Powers,  Decatur,  111.  4  cases  Nov.  11/62     G.  W.  Desp. 

Burgest  &  Adams,  Cleveland,  9  cases  Feb.   1863      Merch.  Despatch 

Ohio 

Atkins,  Steale  &  White  23  cases  Sept.  25, 1863  G.  W.  &  D.  M.  Line 

Milwaukee  price  ranges  from  $1.15  to  87c. 

O.  Rugg,  Bloomington,  HI.  i  case    Feb.   1863      G.  W.  Despt. 

D.  Rugg,  Champaign,  111.  12  cases  ?  1863            L.  S.  &  M.  S.  via 

(60  pr.  Chicago  Ship  to 

cases)  Worcester 

Nickerson,  Harris  &  Moseley  16  cases  July   23  &      via  N.  Y.  &  P.  R.  R. 

Philadelphia  Oct.  14, 1863 

range  $.95-$!. 1 5 
Conant,  Warren  &  Co.  Boston  7  cases  Aug.  10, 1863 

C.  M.  Lee  &  Bros.  Boston  13  cases  Aug.  & 

Sept.  1863 
Messrs  F.  C.  &  M.  D.  Wells  40  cases  Nov.  3, 1863  Union  Desp, 

Some  as  high  as  $1.40  pair 
Goat 
Mead,  Stowell  &  Co.,  N.  Y.  20  cases  Sept  25  & 

Dec.  II,  1863 
Some  as  high  as  $1.30 


242 


APPENDICES 


From  Order  Book,  February  23,  1S61  to  Nov.  2S,  1865. 


Finn 
R.  Elmer,  Springfield,  Mass. 


Baldwin,  Fisher  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 


Dif.  sizes  kinds 

&  prices  1863-4 

amount  date 


Shipped  via 


I  case    Sept.  26 

I  case 

3/7  L.  L. 

Calf.  1.15 
21  cases  Oct.  3,  9  & 

Nov.  17,  1863 

5  cases  Oct.  3,  1863 
32  cases  July  11, 1863  G.  W.  &  M.  C.  Line 


Claflin,  Mellen  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 
Geo.  O.  Catlin,  Leavenworth, 

Kan. 
C.  M.  Henderson  &  Co.,  29  cases  Jan.  29, 1863  Mer.  Despatch 

Chicago  prices  70c.,  87c.,  $1.05,  $1.10 

F.  C.  &  AL  D.  Wells,  Chicago        56  cases  Feb  3  &  L.  S.  &  M.  S.  R.  R 

L.  L.  Buff  Apr.  9,  1863 

15  cases  Oct.      3/63     Nett  30  days 
8  cases  Nov.    9/63    Mer.  Desp. 
57  cases  Dec.  19, 1863 


Wells  &  Christie,  N.  Y. 
John  Powell,  Dayton,  Ohio 
Messrs.  Hoagland,  Dubois  & 
Magovern,  N.  Y. 
Wells  &  Christie,  N.  Y. 
John  Powell,  Dayton,  Ohio 


Hoagland,  Dubois  & 

Magovern,  N.  Y. 
Howes,  Hyatt  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 
R.  &  J.  Cummings,  Toledo, 

Ohio 
Sterling  &  Franks,  Phil 


15  cases  Mar.  3  &  16 
12  cases  Jan.  3, 1864    Mer.  Desp. 
2  cases  Jan.    29 
32  cases  Mar.  16 

4  cases  Jan.      i 
14  cases  July    29  ? 


4  cases  Feb. 


Bailey  &  Noyes,  White  Cloud, 
Ks. 


Gasten  &  Stowell,  N.  Y. 


P.  &  N.  L.  R.  R.  via 
C.  &  A.  R.  R. 
7  cases  Feb.  i  July     Union  Despatch 
13,  &  Oct.  24 
some  as  high  as  $1.85 

71  cases  June  10 
75     "      Aug.  12 
(These  were  mostly 
Youths  and  Boys) 
Mead  &  Stowell,  N.  Y.  64  cases  June  15  & 

20  Aug.  12  & 
Nov.  17 
Messrs.  A.  &  A.  G.  Trask,  N.  Y.  127  cases  June  28 

Mar. 
Hedges  &  Powers,  N.  Y.  47  cases  Nov.  18,  28  & 

30 
ranging  Si .05  to  $1.87 
eg.  10  c  3/7  L.  L.  Buff  Lace 


APPENDICES 


243 


From  Order  Book,  February  23,  1861  to  Nov.  28,  1865. 


Firm 
E.  B.  Fuller,  Fredonia,  N.  Y. 

D.  &  W.  B.  Bailey, 
Champaign,  111. 


Dif.  sizes  kinds 
&  prices 
amount 


1864-5 
date 


Shipped  via 
3  cases  July  Send  to  Dunkirk  via 

E.  Albany 
5  cases  July  20, 1864  C/o  P.  Mclntyre, 

Boston. 


G.  0.  Catlin,  Leavenworth,  Ks 

8  cases  July 

25 

Ship  to  H.  A.  Ball 
Boston. 

J.  S.  Christie,  N.  Y. 

62  cases  Aug. 

12 

D.  Rugg,  Champaign,  111. 

6  cases  Aug. 
of  60  pr. 
each  2 
cases 

15 

Merchants  Desp. 

V.  Barber,  Decatur,  lU. 

13  cases  Aug. 

18 

(1                   a 

BiU  Wheelock  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 

9  cases  Oct. 

21 

via  N.  L.  W.  &  P.  R.  R 

Mabie,  Manly,  Murray  & 

26  cases  Nov. 

18 

Morgan,  N.  Y. 

James  French,  N.  Y. 

36  cases  Nov. 
28 

18  & 

W.  A.  Ransome  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 

2  cases  Nov. 

18 

Washington  Olds  Agt,  Albany, 

16  cases  Aug. 

23 

Merchants  Desp. 

111.  c/o  Snider  &  Co.,  Fuller, 

111. 

Messrs  Porter  &  Higby,  N.  Y. 

19  cases 
i.  e.  1 140 
pair  Mar. 

L.  E.  Schoonmaker  &  Co., 

2  cases 

N.Y. 

R.  &  J.  Cummings,  Toledo, 

6  cases  Feb. 

I 

Merchants  Desp. 

Ohio 

Mark  N.  T.  Co., 

Steamer  on  Lake 

c/o  J.  E.  Bacon, 

Worcester 

55  cases  July 

14  & 

Nov. 

10 

G.  0.  Catlin,  Leavenworth,  Ks. 

27  cases  July : 

[1, 1865  Send  to  A.  Strong  & 

Co. 

J.  S.  Christie,  N.  Y. 

26  cases  July 

14 

Sept. 

2 

D.  Rugg,  Champaign,  111. 

29  cases  July 

22  & 

Merchants  Desp. 

Aug. 

I 

V.  Barber,  Decatur,  III. 

33  cases  Aug. 
Boys,  Childrens, 
Youths,  men  — 
all  dif.  kinds. 

21 

Merchants  Desp. 

BiU  Wheelock  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 

20  cases  Nov. 

27 

via  N.  L.  W.  &  P.  R.  R. 

244 


APPENDICES 


From  Order  Book,  February  23,  1861  to  Nov.  28,  1865. 


Finn 

Mabie,  Manly,  Murray  & 
Morgan,  N.  Y. 

John  Powell  &  Co.,  Dayton 
Ohio 

Atkins,  Steale  &  White, 
Milwaukee 

C.  M.  Lee  &  Bros.,  Boston 

Messrs.  A.  B.  Smith  &  Co. 
Madison,  Indiana 

O.  Rugg,  Bloomington,  III. 

Mead,  Townsend  &  Andrews, 

N.Y. 

Howes,  Hyatt  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 

Marcy  &  Haynes,  N.  Y. 
Burgest  &  Adams,  Cleveland 


Hoagland,  Dubois  & 
McGovern,  N.  Y. 

French,  Powell  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 

Cutter,  Mcintosh  &  Co., 
Springfield 


Messrs.  Fargo,  Bill  &  Co., 
Chicago,  111. 

Chas.  F.  Parker  &  Co.,  Boston 

Baldwin,  Fisher  &  Co.,  N.  Y. 

Smith  &  Maynard,  N.  Y. 


Dif .  sizes  kinds 
&  prices 
amount 


i86s 
date 


Shipped  via 

127  cases  July   17- 

Aug.  16,  186s 
II  cases  Feb.  2, 1865    via  Worcester  & 
range  .65  to  $1.90  Providence 

6s  cases  July  18, 1865  N.  T.  Co.  via 
boys,  youths  &  W.  &  N.  R.  R. 

children  J.  E.  Bacon  Agt 

30  cases  July   27  & 
Aug.  23 


15  cases  July  26 


G.  W.  Despatch  via 
Cincinnati  Care  of 
Mailboat 

Merchants  Despatch 


46  cases  Sept.  13 
161  cases  Aug.  2  &  23 
&  Oct.  18 

202  cases  Aug.  1865 
mostly  boys  &  youths 

18  cases  Aug.  19, 1865 

20  cases  Aug.  26  &       Merchants  Despatch 
Sept.    2 
"Take  all  I  have  of 
Buff  &  Split  Bal." 

73  cases  Sept.  14  & 
Oct.  17, 1865 

31  cases  Sept.  17, 1865 

42  cases  Oct.    19 

Nov.  13 
Dec.     6 
Youths  &  Boys 

43  cases  Nov.  8, 1865  L.  S.  &  M.  S. 
Boys  and  Youths  Red  Line 

10  cases  Nov.  15 

4  cases  Nov.  27 

4  cases  Nov.  28 


APPENDICES  245 


XXVI 

The  McKay  Machine 

Mr.  Lyman  R.  Blake  made  a  sworn  statement  in  1872  concerning  his 
invention  of  the  so-called  McKay  machine  in  connection  with  his 
application  for  the  extension  of  his  patent  of  July  6,  1858,  as  follows:  ^ 

1  entered  the  firm  of  Gurney  &  Mears,  in  South  Abington,  in  1857.  At 
that  time  all  boots  and  shoes  made  where  I  lived  had  their  soles  united  with 
the  uppers  by  pegging  or  nailing.  It  was  not  untU  some  time  after  I  made 
my  invention  that  I  ever  saw  a  shoe  sewed  by  hand.  To  increase  the  busi- 
ness of  my  firm  (Gurney,  Mears  &  Blake),  it  was  desirable  to  manufacture 
sewed  shoes,  and  as  there  were  no  workmen  in  and  about  Abington  skUled  in 
such  work,  I  began  to  consider  whether  or  not  I  could  devise  machinery  for 
sewing  soles  to  boots  and  shoes.  When  I  had  clearly  in  mind  a  conception  of 
my  invention,  which  was  afterwards  patented  by  me,  I  went  to  my  partners 
for  consent  to  build  a  machine.  At  first  they  objected,  but  afterwards  con- 
sented that  I  might  build  it  with  my  own  money,  provided  the  firm  should 
have  the  use  of  the  machine. 

The  machine  was  built  —  how,  when  and  where  I  shall  prove  hereafter  — 
and  was  used  by  and  for  the  firm  —  to  what  extent  and  with  what  success, 
will  also  be  proved.  .  .  .  After  my  return  to  Massachusetts,''  being  in  im- 
proved health  and  desirous  of  aiding  in  the  introduction  of  my  sole  sewing 
invention  to  public  use,  I  joined  Mr.  McKay  in  1861,  and  with  some  excep- 
tions, which  I  wUl  state,  have  kept  such  connections  with  him.  In  said  time 
I  have  labored  in  every  way  possible  to  increase  the  capacity  for  work  of 
machines  embodying  my  invention,  to  instruct  operators  to  run  them,  to 
induce  manufacturers  to  use  them  and  to  remove  from  the  public  mind  all 
prejudice  concerning  the  machines.  I  have  also  made  many  inventions  re- 
lating to  the  business  of  sewing  soles  by  mechanism.  All  of  which  have,  by 
deed  of  assignment  before  referred  to,  passed  to  the  ownership  of  Mr.  McKay 
and  his  successors. 

There  are  in  the  United  States  sixteen  of  such  patents  for  my  individual 
invention,  and  six  in  each  of  which  I  am  one  of  joint  inventors.  Some  of 
these  relate  to  turned  soles.  I  have  also  been  employed  for  about  a  year  on 
an  invention  for  naihng  soles,  which  invention  has  passed  to  McKay  and 
others. 

After  my  return  from  Staunton,  Va.,  my  first  service  rendered  in  connec- 
tion with  my  invention  was  in  experimenting  with  the  machines  built  by 
Mr.  McKay,  and  afterwards  in  working  them  in  sewing  the  shoes  for  the 
Mass.  Light  ArtUlery  Battery.  Next  I  sewed  the  shoes  for  one  or  two  regi- 
ments, and  afterwards  many  thousands  of  pairs  of  army  shoes;  all  the  time 

^  From  a  copy  of  the  report  before  Patents  Case  No.  20,775. 

2  He  had  been  in  Staunton,  Va.,  seeking  to  regain  his  health. 


246  APPENDICES 

keeping  watch  of  the  operation  and  wear  of  the  machines,  and  advising  Mr. 
McKay  wherein  they  were  deficient  and  how  they  should  be  improved. 

This  army  work  was  very  heavy,  and  was  undertaken  with  a  view  to  test 
the  machines,  that  they  might  be  rendered  nearly  perfect  before  they  were 
sold  to  the  public. 

The  patents  before  alluded  to  have  been  taken  between  the  date  of  my 
first  patent  and  the  present  time,  and  include  improvements  in  and  additions 
to  the  sewing  machine  patented  in  1858;  machines  for  waxing  thread  and  for 
channeling  soles  preparatory  to  sewing;  devices  for  lasting;  for  sewing;  im- 
provements in  the  arrangements  of  the  soles  and  vamps;  to  adapt  them  for 
sewing  by  mechanism,  etc. 

I  have  traveled  largely  over  the  United  States,  and  have  instructed  men 
how  to  use  the  sewing  machines  and  their  adjuncts,  and  have  organized  the 
forces  in  the  workshops,  so  that  in  adopting  the  new  system  confusion  and 
delay  have  been  prevented.  I  have  endeavored  to  extend  the  knowledge  of 
my  invention,  and  have  aided  manufacturers  in  every  way  in  my  power  to  do 
a  safe  and  profitable  business  with  my  invention,  and  have  instructed  them 
and  their  workmen  how  to  use  it  so  as  to  produce  work  of  high  quality.  Prior 
to  my  invention,  no  machine  existed  for  sewing  soles  to  boots  and  shoes. 


XXVII 

Excerpts  from  the  Batcheller  Accounts,  Brookfield 
A  ccounts  for  a  Single  Year  iSyo 


Dr. 

Boston  Store 

I 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Jan.   31 

To  amt. 

$138.00 

Jan. 

6 

By  Stock  a/c 

$261,328.52 

Mar.  31 

u 

a 

35-00 

Jan. 

31 

a 

Amt. 

28,457.21 

May  31 

u 

u 

102.60 

Feb. 

28 

u 

u 

54,571-05 

Oct.    31 

u 

a 

260.00 

Mar. 

31 

u 

a 

45,399-31 

Nov.  30 

u 

« 

67.27 

Apr. 

30 

u 

u 

32,444.24 

Dec.     8 

u 

u 

154-35 

May 

31 

li 

u 

41,800.87 

tt           u 

u 

sds. 

62.76 

June 

30 

u 

u 

35,96385 

u         u 

u 

u 

29,256.30 

July 

30 

a 

u 

38,343.41 

a         u 

u 

stock  act 

1,700,342.41 

Aug. 

31 

u 

u 

58,324-55 

u         u 

u 

a 

7,938.70 

Sept. 

30 

a 

u 

66,380.96 

u         u 

u 

bal. 

268,956.97 

Oct. 

31 

u 

u 

65,226.75 

Nov. 

30 

u 

u 

58,797-48 

Dec. 

8 

a 

u 

32,773-37 

u 

« 

1,187,502.79 

$2,007,314.36  $  2,007,314.36 

^  The  firm's  store  in  Boston,  where  the  factory  product  was  disposed  of. 


APPENDICES  247 

Dr.  Cash  Cr. 

1870  1870 

Jan.      7  To  bal.  $21,460.68  Jan.    31  By  amt.  $37,925.16 

"      31  "  amt.  30,099.70  Feb.   28  "  "  53,794-55 

Feb.  28  "  "  S5.726.93  Mar.  31  "  "  52,950.07 

Mar.  31  "  "  42,073.22  Apr.  30  "  "  33,523-65 

Apr.  30  "  "  35,539-19  May  31  "  "  34,318.06 

May  31  "  "  42,469.20  June  30  "  "  39,116.36 

June  50  "  "  37,584-39  July  30  "  "  48,892.12 

July  30  "  "  39,726.42  Aug.  31  "  "  47,250.9s 

Aug.  31  "  "  58,291.49  Sept.  30  "  "  56,321.73 

Sept.  30  "  "  65,440.44  Oct.    31  "  "  74,827.26 

Oct.   31  «  "  68,243-85  Nov.  30  "  "  53,620.17 

Nov.  30  "  «  5.5,669.34  Dec.     8  "  «  35,9io.o8 

Dec.     8  "  "  33,163.17                                   Bal.  15,037-86 

$583,488.02 

Dr.  Cutting  Dept.  Cr. 

1870 

Jan.   31     To  amt.  $5,240.95        Jan.     6  $43,412.43 

Feb.  28      "      «  '  ^       .., 

Mar.  31      "      « 
Apr.  30      «      " 

May  31      "      "  3,537-24        June    9     By  amt.  $1.50 

June  30      "      "  4,326.80        July     5      "      "  .62 

July  30      "      "  4,915-49  "        8      "      "  .97 

Aug.  31      "      "  5,915-50        Aug.  13      "      "  .50 

Sept.  30      "      "  5,714-64  «      17      «      «  2.50 

Oct.   31      "      "  5,734-81  "      22      "      «  2.75 

Nov.  30      "      "  '       403.67        Sept.    6      "      «  1. 00 

Dec.     8      "      «  6,454-34        Oct.      7      «      «  .56 

•50 

.96 

-50 

24.90 

54,213-34 
$54,250.60  $54,250.60 


$583,488.02 

Cutting  Dept 

70 

$5,240.95 

Jan. 

6 

5,673-41 

included  in 

bal. 

3,807.3s 

2,526.40 

3,537-24 

June 

9 

By 

amt 

4,326.80 

July 

5 

u 

u 

4,915-49 

u 

8 

u 

u 

5,915-50 

Aug. 

13 

u 

u 

5,714-64 

U 

17 

a 

a 

5,734-8i 

U 

22 

u 

u 

403-67 

Sept. 

6 

u 

a 

6,454-34 

Oct. 

7 

a 

a 

Oct. 

25 

u 

u 

Nov. 

9 

u 

u 

u 

12 

u 

a 

Dec. 

7 

u 

u 

u 

8 

248  APPENDICES 


Dr. 

Bottoming  Dept. 

Cr. 

1870 

Jan.   31 

To  amt. 

$28,031.02 

Dec.     8 

By  amt. 

$272,314.48 

Feb.   28 

u 

a 

30,252.56 

Mar.  31 

a 

a 

21,144.06 

Apr.  30 

u 

a 

12,783.22 

May  31 

a 

a 

16,308.26 

June  30 

u 

a 

20,805.03 

July  30 

u 

a 

23,954.06 

Aug.  31 

a 

u 

28,467.00 

Sept.  30 

u 

a 

28,800.77 

Oct.    31 

a 

a 

29,095.06 

Nov.  30 

u 

a 

27,741.07 

Dec.     8 

u 

a 

4,93237 

$272,314.48 

$272,314.48 

Dr. 

Stock  Account 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Jan.     7 

To  Boston  Store  $261,328.52 

Jan.     8 

By  Amt. 

$111.70 

14 

u 

Sds 

479.70 

"      II 

u 

a 

2.85 

IS 

u 

Amt. 

80.00 

"      20 

u 

a 

6.54 

28 

u 

a 

13.00 

"      24 

it 

u 

3-66 

31 

a 

u 

467.00 

"      26 

a 

u 

.42 

u 

u 

a 

549.68 

"     31 

u 

u 

206.91 

u 

u 

u 

3-50 

Feb.     5 

« 

u 

149-35 

u 

u 

u 

32.50 

"     II 

(( 

u 

S-27 

a 

u 

u 

197.91 

"     17 

u 

u 

311.40 

Feb.     4 

a 

u 

49.62 

"     21 

u 

a 

.80 

II 

u 
u 

Sds. 

a 

294.15 
67.20 

"     28 

u 

u 

265.23 

16 

u 

u 

Amt. 

145-74 

$1,064.13 

21 

a 

u 

228.00 

28 

u 

Sds. 

69.20 

u 

u 

Amt. 

1,546.19 

a 

u 

49.00 

u 

a 

46.00 

$265,646.91 

1870 

1870 

Dec.     8 

To  amt. 

$282,532.77 

Dec.     8 

By 

amt. 

$5,521.20 

u         u 

a 

a 

40.42 

a         a 

a 

u 

57-84 

u         u 

"  Sds 

517,101.43 

u         u 

u 

u 

1,700,342.41 

12,929.39 

7,938.70 

1,179,662.69 

Bal 

m 

280,349.45 

1,942.90 

$1,994,209.60 

$1,994,209.60 

APPENDICES  249 


Dr. 

Fre] 

[GHT 

Cr. 

1870 

Jan.   31 

To  amt. 

$1,200.30 

May    4 

By  amt. 

$254-67 

Feb.   28 

a 

u 

1,032.76 

Sept.    8 

u 

u 

2.20 

Mar.  31 

u 

u 

901.76 

u         u 

u 

a 

2.45 

Apr.  30 

u 

u 

703.89 

Oct.     II 

a 

a 

g.oo 

May  31 

u 

u 

1,199.20 

Nov.    8 

u 

u 

11.00 

June  30 

u 

a 

1,096.33 

Dec.     8 

a 

a 

14,536.56 

July  30 

u 

« 

1,650.2s 

Aug.  31 

u 

a 

1,310-97 

Sept.  30 

u 

u 

1,622.61 

Oct.   31 

u 

a 

1,402.14 

Nov.  30 

u 

u 

2,304-50 

Dec.     8 

u 

a 

391-17 
$14,815.88 

$14,815.88 

Dr. 

Running  Expenses 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Jan.   31 

To  amt. 

$171.70 

Apr.     8 

By  amt. 

$5-00 

Feb.   28 

a 

u 

157-65 

«      12 

u 

u 

20.72 

Mar.  31 

(I 

u 

1,143.80 

Dec.     8 

u 

u 

3.00 

Apr.  30 

« 

a 

826.57 

u         u 

« 

a 

5.485-94 

May  31 

u 

u 

654-36 

June  30 

(1 

u 

1,210.88 

July  30 

u 

a 

164.25 

Aug.  31 

u 

a 

67-50 

Sept.  30 

u 

u 

270.10 

Oct.   31 

u 

u 

447.21 

Nov.  30 

u 

u 

347-64 

Dec.     8 

u 

u 

53-00 

$5,514.66 

$5,514.66 

Dr. 

General  Expenses 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Jan.   31 

To  amt. 

$182.76 

Sept.  21 

By 

Amt. 

$.40 

Feb.  28 

u 

a 

369-77 

Oct.    18 

u 

a 

40.00 

Mar.  31 

u 

u 

304.06 

Dec.     8 

u 

u 

21.00 

Apr.  30 

u 

a 

258.98 

«         a 

a 

u 

7,139.1s 

May  31 

a 

a 

299.20 

June  30 

u 

a 

276.98 

July  30 

u 

u 

341.26 

Aug.  31 

u 

a 

304.16 

Sept.  30 

u 

a 

446.23 

Oct.   31 

u 

u 

707.74 

Nov,  30 

a 

u 

2,227.04 

Dec.    8 

u 

u 

1,482.37 

$7,200.55  $7,200.55 


250  APPENDICES 

Dr.  Teaming  Cr. 

1870  1870 

Jan.   31  To  arat.  $418.00        May    4    By  amt.                      $164.55 

Feb.  28  "  "  382.37        Dec.     8      "      "                        4,672.64 

Mar.  31  "  "  322.59 

Apr.  30  "  "  316.23 

May  31  "  "  36556 

June  30  "  "  311.26 

July  30  "  "  579-54 

Aug.  31  "  "  430-28 

Sept.  30  "  "  48963 

Oct.   31  "  "  479-58 

Nov.  30  "  "  575-42 

Dec.     8  "  "  166.73 


$4,837.19  $4,837-19 

Dr.  Interest  Cr. 


By  amt.  $3.22 

"      "  .94 

«      «  4-66 

"      "  4.37 

"      «  I95-IO 

725.02 


1870 

1870 

Jan.  31 

To  amt. 

$.29 

Oct.  3 

Feb.  28 

u 

u 

41.22 

"   17 

Mar. 

u 

u 

43-74 

<;    u 

Apr. 

(( 

u 

36.47 

"   3x 

May 

u 

a 

21.24 

Dec.  8 

June 

u 

a 

39-92 

((   « 

July 

« 

a 

36.39 

Aug.  31 

u 

a 

38.48 

Sept. 

u 

u 

49-49 

Oct. 

a 

<i 

171-93 

Nov. 

u 

u 

34.20 

Dec.  8 

u 

a 

419.94 

$933-31  $933-31 


APPENDICES  251 


Dr. 

Machinery 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Jan.     7 

To  bal. 

$27,420.42 

Jan.    26 

By  amt. 

$-75 

"     31 

"   amt. 

269.11 

"      31 

u 

u 

2.00 

Feb.   28 

K           U 

308.71 

Feb.     28 

i. 

(( 

2.00 

Mar. 

U           U 

604.72 

Mar.  17 

u 

u 

3-40 

Apr. 

u        a 

281.28 

"      29 

u 

li 

2.00 

May 

u        a 

237-76 

May    7 

u 

a 

2.00 

June 

u        u 

208.61 

"     31 

u 

ti 

2.00 

July  30 

u         tl 

159-70 

June    3 

11 

It 

1.40 

Aug. 

u        u 

317-31 

"        9 

u 

It 

9.72 

Sept. 

u        u 

445.00 

"      30 

u 

ti 

2.00 

Oct. 

If       a 

949.68 

July   28 

u 

ti 

1.40 

Nov. 

u        a 

604.26 

"     30 

u 

tt 

2.00 

Dec.     8 

u        a 

635.22 

Aug.  23 

u 

ti 

5-6i 

u         u 

«       a 

4,208.46 

"     31 

u 

ti 

4.00 

((         a 

a 

u 

2.00 

Sept.  30 

u 

u 

2.00 

Oct.    12 

u 

li 

4.00 

«     18 

u 

li 

13-50 

((       ti 

u 

It 

12.00 

u         u 

u 

li 

76.00 

"        22 

u 

u 

6.00 

"        31 

u 

a 

2.00 

Nov.  30 

u 

it 

2.00 

Dec.     8 

u 

It 

27.80 

u         u 

ti 
u 

It 

bal 

12,929.39 
23,533-27 

$36,650.24 

$36,650.24 

Dr. 

Insurance 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Feb.  II 

To  cash 

$20.00 

Dec.     8 

By  Boston  Store 

$447.75 

Mar.  12 

U            li 

409.25 

"     31 

u        a 

8.50 

Oct.    14 

a        a 

10.00 

$447.75 

$447-75 

Dr. 

General  Work 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Jan.    29 

To  amt. 

$.50 

Feb.   14 

By 

amt. 

$1.87 

"      31 

u       u 

20.37 

Aug.  19 

« 

ti 

100.00 

u         a 

a       a 

9.994.57 

5-00 

Feb.     5 

u       a 

and  so  on  to 

15-75 

121. 13 

a  total  of 

129,852.53 

By  bal. 

129,624.53 

Dec.    8 

To  bal. 

$129,624.53 

$129,852.53 

252  APPENDICES 

Dr. 

1870 
Jan.   31 
to 

Dec.     8        total 


Dr. 

1870 

Feb.   28    To  amt. 

Mar.  31      "     " 


Box  Account 

Cr. 

1870 

Dec.     8 

By  amt. 

$20,261.48 

$20,261.48 

$20,261.48 

Real  Estate 

Cr. 

$209.07 

1870 

390-77 

May  26 

By  amt. 

$26.60 

154.11 

Aug.  31 

<( 

u 

302.16 

643-12 

Sep.      7 

a 

u 

8.20 

Oct.     3 

a 

Sds 

1,095.8s 

"        S 

a 

amt. 

3-00 

3,806.62 

"      18 

u 

u 

10.00 

56.19 

Nov.  15 

a 

u 

47-70 

99.16 

"      30 

a 

u 

1,743-13 

190.70 

Dec.     8 

u 

u 

345-00 

7,532.18 

u         u 

a 

u 

40.03 

12,213.44 

a         u 

u 

u 

8.00 
21,665.69 

Oct.   31 
Dec.     8 


total  $25,295.36  $25,295.36 

Dr.  Real  Estate  Expenses  Cr. 

1870  1870 

Jan.    25    To  cash  $15.75        Dec.     8    By  amt.  $1,116.97 

and  so  on  in  detail 
to  a  total  -1 

I^ec.     8  $1,116.97  $1,116.97 


APPENDICES  253 


Dr. 

House  Rent 

Cr. 

1870 

1870 

Apr. 

28    To  amt. 

$1.87 

Jan.    29 

By 

amt. 

$275.00 

Feb.   25 

« 

(( 

265.20 

bal. 

3,631.64 

Mar.  31 

u 

(( 

263-57 

Apr.     8 

(1 

a 

54-25 

"     II 

u 

u 

3.00 

"      29 

a 

a 

191-50 

"     30 

u 

u 

24.00 

May  28 

u 

(( 

203.72 

June  27 

u 

u 

224-74 

July  30 

u 

<( 

226.84 

Aug.  30 

<( 

« 

229.25 

Sept.  23 

u 

u 

229.25 

Oct.    27 

u 

a 

222.75 

Nov.  25 

u 

a 

199-25 

Dec.     7 

u 

11 

958.33 

«       8 

u 

a 

62.86 

$3,633-51 

$3,633-51 

Dr. 

Charles  H.  Stoddard 

Cr. 

1871 

1871 

June 

I     To  cash 

$60.00 1 

May  31 

By  work 

$60.90 

u 

13      "      " 

20.00 

June  30 

u 

(( 

50.70 

July 

u        u 

30.00 

July   31 

a 

(( 

43.80 

« 

31    "    " 

43.00 

Aug.  31 

u 

« 

78.90 

Sept. 

u        a 

80.00 

Sept.  30 

u 

u 

64.65 

« 

2«         «         « 

65.00 

Oct.    31 

u 

u 

45.00 

Nov. 

J         «         « 

45.00 

Nov.  29 

u 

iC 

44.10 

u 

29        "         " 

4S-00 

1872 

1872 

Jan.      8 

u 

tt 

60.60 

Jan. 

J         u         u 

8      "      " 

25.00 
35-65 

$448.65 

$448.65 

Dr. 

Boston  &  Albany  Railroad 

Cr. 

1873 

1873 

Sept.    3    To  Bal 

$.60        Sept.  30    By  freight 

$2,720.06 

"       9      «   draft 

842.77 

"      22      "       " 

1,058.14 

"      29      "      « 

430-21 

Oct.     3      "      " 

388.34 

$2,720.06  $2,720.06 

*  Monthly  pay  of  a  cutter  on  a  piece  work  basis. 


254  APPENDICES 

Dr.  Boston  &  Albany  Railroad  Cr. 


1873 

1873 

Oct.     8 

To  draft 

$614.14 

Oct.    31     By  freight 

$1,626.75 

"      21 

u 

u 

536.59 

«      28 

u 

u 

260.10 

Nov.    3 

u 

u 

215-92 

$1,626.75 

$1,626.75 

1873 

1873 

Nov.  II 

To  draft 

$275.94 

Nov.  29    By  freight 

$844.96 

"      19 

<i 

u 

226.95 

"      25 

u 

u 

148.57 

Dec.     2 

u 

u 

193-50 

$844.96  $844.96 

Dr.        McKay  Heeling  MACmNE  Association        Cr.  Boston,  Mass. 

1874  1874 

Dec.     7    To  draft  $242.30        Nov.  30    By  bill  $242.30 

1875  Dec.  31      "     "  243.56 
Jan.      4      "       "                            243.56         1875 

Feb.     4  "  "  248.28  Jan.   30  "  "  248.28 

Mar.  10  "  "  274.95  Feb.   27  "  "  274.95 

Apr.     5  "  "  397-60  Mar.  31  "  "  397-6o 

May    5  "  "  380.25  May    5  «  "  380.25 

Purchases,  18^0-18^5 

E.  &  A.  Batcheller  were  buying  stock  from  many  fifms.   They  had 
accounts  with:  — 

Whittemore  Brothers  &  Co.,  Boston;  for  foot  power  pegging  machinery; 

also  other  machinery  and  blacking. 
Calvin  W.  Hoyt,  painter  on  jobs. 
Jesse  Moulton,  foundry  man  at  East  Brookfield;  made  presses  and 

cast  iron  work. 
W.  H.  Whiting,  Express  (local). 
E.  Howe,  Express  agent. 

American  Sack  Co.,  Fairhaven,  Mass.;  cotton  Uning. 
George  S.  Homer,  New  Bedford;  cotton  lining. 
Calvin  Foster  &  Co.,  Worcester;  hardware. 
Mt.  Tom  Thread  Co.,  East  Hampton,  Mass. 
Bay  State  Union  Oil  Works,  Boston. 
Bay  State  Grease  Co.,  Boston. 
Dunbar,  Hobard  &  Whidden,  South  Abington,  Mass.;  makers  of  nails; 

slugs  for  heels. 


APPENDICES  255 

Brown  &  Bros.,  Waterbury,  Conn. 

A.  C.  &  A.  H.  Foster  Contract  Co.;  contracting,  shipping,  including 
polish,  ties  and  foxing. 

P.  H.  Kellogg,  contract  account;  for  finishing  bottoms. 

J.  B.  Dewing,  foreman;  handled  thousands  of  dollars  1869-74;  later 
had  contract;  bought  the  last  factory  from  Haskells. 

Stoddard  &  Montague,  contractors,  after  Duncan. 

Last  Factory  1872-75  (Batchellers  owned  this,  but  had  separate  book- 
keeping system  for  it). 

Smith  &  Dane,  West  Brookfield,  Mass.;  Batchellers  sold  lasts  to  them. 

J.  Punderford,  of  New  Haven,  Conn.;  bought  lasts. 

Hunt,  Holbrook  &  Barber,  of  Hartford,  bought  lasts. 

Dexter,  Stoddard,  carpenter  account;  carpenters  for  all  the  buildings. 

Charles  B.  Lincoln. 

O.  O.  Patten. 

Pawtucket  Braid  Co.;  linings. 

Bay  State  Needle  Co.,  Worcester;  needles. 

John  D.  Lamson. 

American  Shoe  Shank  Co.,  Boston;  pressed  leather-board  shank. 

Sumner,  Pratt  &  Co.,  Worcester;  iron  shafting. 

Leonard,  Bundy  &  Co.,  Boston. 

Bliss  &  Potter,  Brookfield;  hardware. 

Wood  &  Light  Machine  Co.,  Worcester,  machinery. 

N.  E.  Awl  &  Needle  Co.,  West  Medway. 

Willimantic  Linen  Co.,  Boston,  Mass. 

North  Brookfield  Savings  Bank. 

Excelsior  Printing  Co.,  North  Brookfield. 

First  Congregational  Society,  North  Brookfield. 

Donner  Kerosene  Oil  Co.,  Boston. 

McKay  Heeling  Machine  Association,  Boston. 

Cutter  Bros.  &  Co.,  Boston. 

Albert  Hobbs. 

Consolidated  Wax  Thread  Sewing  Machine  Co.  of  Boston. 

American  Fire  Extinguisher  Co.  of  Boston. 

Vitrified  Emery  Wheel  Mfg.  Co.,  Ashland,  Mass. 

Joseph  F.  Sargent,  Boston;  machinist,  repairing. 

Putnam  Machine  Co.,  Fitchburg;  engine  for  main  power. 

A.  M.  Howe;  for  trees. 

Barbour  Bros.,  N.  Y.;  thread,  linen. 

Grafton  Awl  Co. 

A.  &  W.  Haskell ;  last  makers. 

Ebenezer  Howe,  Spencer,  Mass.;   cases,  boxes. 

J.  R.  Cushman  &  Son,  Amherst;  leather  board. 

Blood  &  Delane;  box  makers. 

Tuttle  &  Adams,  Boston. 

Anthony  &  Cushman,  Taunton;  nails. 

N.  D.  Ladd  &  Co.,  Sturbridge,  Mass.,  die  makers  for  heels  and  uppers 
and  sole  leather. 


256  APPENDICES 

XXVIII 

Samuel  Drew,  the  Shoemaker  Metaphysician 

Samuel  Drew,  known  in  England  as  the  metaphysician,^  the  ''Self- 
Taught  Cornishman,"  wrote  and  had  published  during  his  life  as  a 
shoemaker,  two  books,  one  on  Immortality  of  the  Soul,  and  another,  a 
reply  to  Thomas  Paine's  Age  of  Reason,  which  brought  him  into 
notoriety  and  obtained  for  him  a  name  as  an  acute  thinker  and  an  able 
controversialist.  In  later  years,  he  preached,  wrote  and  published 
many  books,  and  was  complimented  by  two  universities,  Aberdeen 
conferring  the  degree  of  A.M.,  and  London  requesting  him  to  be  put  in 
competition  for  the  Chair  of  Moral  Philosophy. 

He  started  out  in  life  at  ten  and  a  half  years  of  age  as  an  apprentice 
to  a  master  who  added  farming  to  shoemaking,  and  made  his  apprentice 
do  likewise.  At  17,  disgusted  with  privations  and  the  slight  knowledge 
and  experience  in  shoemaking  he  was  getting,  he  ran  away  before  his 
contract  for  nine  years  was  fulfilled.  A  good  natured  shoemaker  in  a 
village  where  he  stopped  in  his  flight,  took  him  on  as  a  journeyman, 
evidently  neglecting  to  ask  for  the  lad's  credientials  as  to  a  completed 
apprenticeship.  Here  the  lad  fell  into  bad  company,  and  was  sent  by 
his  father  to  St.  Austell,  to  work  under  a  master  who  combined  the 
three  somewhat  kindred  businesses  of  saddler,  shoemaker  and  book- 
binder. His  shop  was  also  a  regular  meeting  place  for  the  gossipers  of 
the  tqjvn  and  for  rehgious  discussion.  Drew,  meanwhile  had  become 
active  in  religious  work  and  views,  and  learned  to  debate  in  this  shop 
with  these  men  while  at  work  with  his  master  on  shoes.  From  this  to 
his  later  studies,  he  was  led  by  reading  Locke's  essay  on  the  Human 
Understanding,  when  a  copy  of  it  was  brought  to  the  shop  to  be 
bound.   "This  book  set  all  my  soul  to  think,"  he  said  later. 

Drew  continued  working  industriously  at  his  trade,  and  filling  up  all  his 
spare  moments  by  reading  such  books  as  came  to  the  shop  to  be  bound,  or 
any  others  he  could  borrow  from  friends.  Attracted  by  one  science  after 
another,  and  finding,  as  most  eager  minds  do,  a  charm  in  each,  he  finally 
settled  to  metaphysics,  because  as  he  sometimes  shrewdly  observed,  among 
other  recommendations  it  has  this,  that  it  requires  fewer  books  than  other 
branches  of  study,  and  may  be  followed  at  the  least  expense.  "It  appeared 
to  be  a  thorny  path;  but  I  determined  nevertheless  to  enter  and  begin  to 

1  Taken  from  Winks:  Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers,  pp.  109-121.  Cf.  J. 
Sparkes  Hall:  Book  of  the  Feet.   Sketch  of  Drew,  pp.  163-175. 


APPENDICES  257 

tread  it,"  he  remarks;  and  adds,  "To  metaphysics  I  then  applied  myself,  and 
became  what  the  world  and  Dr.  Clarke  call  a  Metaphysician." 

By  the  advice  and  help  of  friends  he  resolved,  in  January,  1787,  to  com- 
mence business  on  his  own  account.  His  savings  at  this  time  amounted  to 
only  fourteen  shillings.  He  was  therefore  compelled  to  borrow  capital,  or 
remain  a  journeyman.  It  was  not  diflficult,  however,  to  find  a  man  in  St. 
Austell  who  was  willing  to  trust  the  now  steady  and  hardworking  shoemaker. 
A  miller  advanced  him  £5  on  the  security  of  his  good  character,  saying, 
*  And  more  if  that's  not  enough,  and  I'll  promise  not  to  demand  it  till  you 
can  conveniently  pay  me.'  Fortunately  for  him,  at  this  time  Dr.  Franklin's 
'Way  to  Wealth'  came  into  his  hands,  and  impressed  him  deeply  with  its 
sage  maxims  and  sound  principles  of  business  and  thrift.  On  one  maxim, 
though  severe,  he  often  at  this  time  acted  literally,  'It  is  better  to  go  supper- 
less  to  bed  than  to  rise  in  debt.'  The  account  which  he  gives  of  the  hard 
work  and  rigid  economy,  and  the  good  fruits  they  bore,  during  his  first  year's 
experience  of  business,  is  highly  creditable  to  him,  and  will  be  best  told  in  his 
own  words:  'Eighteen  hours  out  of  the  twenty- four  did  I  regularly  work, 
and  sometimes  longer,  for  my  friends  gave  me  plenty  of  employment,  and 
until  the  bills  became  due  I  had  no  means  of  paying  wages  to  a  journeyman. 
I  was  indefatigable,  and  at  the  year's  end  I  had  the  satisfaction  of  paying  the 
five  pounds  which  had  been  so  kindly  lent  to  me,  and  finding  myself,  with  a 
tolerable  stock  of  leather,  clear  of  the  world.'  .  .  . 

An  incident  which  happened  about  this  time  will  show  to  what  dangers  his 
social  disposition  and  fondness  for  debate  exposed  him,  and  how  slight  an 
incident  saved  him  from  the  .snare.  He  had  become  enamoured  of  pohtical 
matters,  and  discussed  them  very  vigorously  with  his  customers  and  others 
who  made  his  work-room  a  meeting-place  where  they  might  hear  and  debate 
the  latest  news.  Sometimes  these  discussions  drew  him  from  home  into  the 
house  of  a  neighbor,  and  so  absorbed  his  time  that  he  found  himself  at  the 
end  of  the  day  far  behind  in  his  work,  and  obliged  to  sit  up  till  midnight  in 
order  to  finish  it.  One  night,  however,  he  received  a  severe  rebuke  from  some 
anonymous  counsellor,  which  effectually  put  a  stop  to  this  bad  habit.  As  he 
sat  at  work  after  most  of  the  neighbors  were  in  bed,  he  heard  footsteps  at  the 
door,  and  presently  a  boy's  shrill  voice  accosted  him  through  the  keyhole 
w^ith  this  sage  remark:  '  Shoemaker,  shoemaker,  work  by  night,  and  run 
about  by  day! '  '  And  did  you,'  inquired  a  friend  to  whom  Drew  told  the 
story,  '  pursue  the  boy  and  chastise  him  for  his  insolence  ?  '  '  No,  no,'  re- 
plied Drew,  who  had  the  wisdom  to  see  that  there  was  more  fault  in  himself 
than  the  boy,  and  had  also  the  moral  courage  and  firmness  of  character  to 
turn  the  annoyance  to  profitable  account  — '  No,  no.  Had  a  pistol  been 
fired  off  at  my  ear  I  could  not  have  been  more  dismayed  or  confounded.  I 
dropped  my  work,  saying  to  myself,  '  True,  true,  but  you  shall  never  have 
that  to  say  of  me  again ! '  Right  well  did  he  keep  to  his  resolve,  and  with  what 
results  we  shall  see. 


258  APPENDICES 

XXIX 

An  English  Bagman 

We  have  the  story  of  Dr.  WiUiam  Carey,  a  bagman  in  England  in  the 
last  quarter  of  the  eighteenth  century,  who  was  also  a  well-trained 
shoemaker,  like  Josiah  Field,  and  tramped  about  to  sell  his  goods.  He 
served  his  apprenticeship  as  a  lad,  worked  as  a  journeyman  for  twelve 
years,  meanwhile  serving  as  a  school  teacher  and  a  village  pastor  in 
North  Hamptonshire.  Though  proficient  as  a  shoemaker,  his  studies 
made  him  absentminded  enough  to  forget  to  fit  shoes  sometimes,  and 
at  others  to  oflfer  two  shoes  which  were  not  a  pair.  To  dispose  of  his 
shoes  in  order  to  get  money  for  more  stock  was  a  problem  after  he  as- 
sumed the  problems  of  independent  master,  so  when  times  were  bad  he 
was  obliged  to  travel  from  village  to  village  to  dispose  of  his  work  and 
get  fresh  orders.  "Once  a  fortnight  he  could  be  seen  walking  eight  or 
ten  miles  to  Northampton  with  his  wallet  full  of  shoes  slung  over  his 
shoulder,  and  returning  home  with  a  fresh  supply  of  leather."  After 
that  for  forty  years  he  worked  and  was  known  as  an  Oriental  scholar, 
a  translator  of  the  Bible,  a  maker  of  a  dictionary  and  grammars  for  the 
study  of  the  East  Indian  tongues,  but  to  the  end  of  his  life  he  used  to 
claim  that  he  was  "only  a  cobbler."  ^ 


XXX 

An  English  Story  of  the  Bfrth  and  Training  ^  of  St.  Crispin 

AND  His  Brother 

How  Crispianus  and  his  brother  Crispine,  the  Two  Sons  of  the  King  of 
Logria  {thro  the  Cruelty  of  the  Tyrant  Maximinus)  were  fain  in 
disguised  Manner  to  seek  their  Lives  Safety,  and  how  they  were  enter- 
tained by  a  Shooe-maker  in  Feversham. 

When  the  Roman  Maximinus  sought  in  cruel  sort  to  bereave  this 
Land  of  all  her  noble  Youth,  or  Youth  of  Noble  Blood;  the  Virtuous 
Queen  of  Logria  (which  now  is  called  Kent)  dwelling  in  the  City  of 
Durovenum,  alias,  Canterbury,  or  the  Court  of  Kentish-men,  having 
at  that  Time  two  young  sons,  sought  all  the  Means  she  could  to  keep 

^  Winks:    Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers,  pp.   130-137.    Cf.  Sparkes  Hall: 
History  of  Boots  and  Shoes,  and  Biographical  Sketches,  pp.  200-201. 
*  The  Delightful  and  Princely  History  of  the  Gentle-Craft,  pp.  57-65. 


APPENDICES  259 

them  out  of  the  Tyrant's  Claws:  And  in  this  Manner  she  spoke  unto 
them. 

My  dear  and  beloved  Sons,  the  Joy  and  Comfort  of  my  Age,  you  see 
the  Dangers  of  these  Times,  and  the  Storms  of  a  Tyrant's  Reign: 
Who  having  now  gathered  together  the  most  part  of  the  young  No- 
bility, to  make  them  Slaves  in  a  Foreign  Country,  seeking  for  you  also, 
thereby  to  make  a  clear  Riddance  of  all  our  born  Princes,' to  the  end  he 
might  plant  Strangers  in  their  stead:  Therefore  (my  sweet  Sons)  take 
the  Counsel  of  your  Mother,  and  seek  in  time  to  prevent  ensuing  Dan- 
ger, which  will  come  upon  us  as  suddenly  as  a  Storm  at  Sea,  and  as 
cruel  as  a  Tyger  in  the  Forest;  therefore  suiting  your  selves  in  honest 
Habit,  seek  some  Service  to  shield  you  from  Mischance,  seeing  Neces- 
sity hath  privileged  those  Places  from  Tyranny.  And  so  (my  Sons)  the 
Heavens  may  raise  you  to  your  deserved  Dignity  and  Honour. 

The  young  Lads  seeing  their  Mother  was  so  earnest  to  have  them 
gone,  fulfilled  her  Commands;  and  casting  off  their  attire,  put  homely 
Garments  on,  and  with  many  bitter  Tears  took  leave  of  their  Mother, 
desiring  her  to  bestow  her  Blessing  on  them. 

O  my  Sons  {quoth  she)  stand  not  now  upon  your  Ceremonies,  had  I 
leisure  to  give  you  one  Kiss,  it  were  something,  the  Lord  Bless  you! 
get  you  gone,  away,  away,  make  hast,  I  say,  let  not  swift  Time  over- 
slip  you,  for  the  Tyrant  is  hard  by:  With  that  she  pushed  them  out  at  a 
back  Door,  and  then  set  her  self  down  to  weep. 

The  two  young  Princes,  which  like  pretty  Lambs  were  straying  they 
knew  not  whither,  at  length  by  good  Fortune  came  to  Feversham, 
where  before  the  Day  peep  they  heard  certain  Shooe-makers  singing, 
being  as  pleasant  at  their  Notes,  as  they  sat  at  their  Business.  .  .  . 

The  young  Princes  perceiving  such  Mirth  to  remain  in  so  homely  a 
Cottage,  judged  by  their  pleasant  Notes,  that  they  were  not  cloyed 
with  many  Cares:  And  therefore  wished  it  might  be  their  good  hap  to 
be  harboured  in  a  Place  of  such  great  Content. 

But  standing  a  long  time  in  doubt  what  to  do,  like  two  distressed 
Strangers,  combating  betwixt  Hope  and  Fear,  at  length  taking  Cour- 
age, Crispianus  knocked  at  the  Door:  What  Knave  knocks  there  ? 
(quoih  one  of  the  Journey-men)  and  by  and  by  takes  his  Quarter-Stafif, 
and  opens  the  Door:  being  as  ready  to  strike  as  speak  saying.  What 
lack  you?  To  whom  Crispianus  made  this  Answer:  Good  Sir,  pardon 
our  Boldness,  and  measure  not  our  Truth  by  our  Rudeness,  we  are  two 
poor  Boys  that  want  a  Service  stript  from  our  Friends  by  the  Fury  of 
these  Wars,  and  therefore  are  we  enforced  succourless  to  crave  Service 


26o  APPENDICES 

in  any  Place.  What  have  you  no  Friends  or  Acquaintance  in  these 
Ports  to  go  to  (said  the  Shooe-maker)  by  whose  Means  you  might  get 
Preferment?  Alas!  Sir  Crispianus,  Necessity  is  despised  of  every  one, 
and  Misery  is  trodden  down  of  many,  but  seldom  or  never  reliev'd; 
yet  notwithstanding,  if  Hope  did  not  yield  us  some  Comfort  of  good 
Day,  we  should  grow  desperate  thro'  Distress.  That  were  great  pity 
(said  the  Shooe-maker)  be  content,  for  as  our  Dame  tells  our  Master,  a 
patient  Man  is  better  than  a  strong  Man:  Stay,  and  I  will  call  our 
Dame,  and  then  you  shall  hear  what  she  will  say.  With  that  he  went  in, 
and  forth  came  his  Dame,  who  beholding  the  Youths  said:  Now,  alas! 
poor  Boys,  how  comes  it  to  pass  that  you  are  out  of  Service  ?  what! 
would  you  be  Shooe  makers  and  learn  the  Gentle-Craft  ?  Yes,  forsooth, 
(said  they)  with  all  our  Hearts.  Now,  by  my  troth  (quoth  she)  you  do 
look  with  honest  true  Faces,  I  will  entreat  my  Husband  for  you,  for  we 
would  gladly  have  good  Boys;  and  if  you  would  be  Just  and  True,  and 
serve  God,  no  doubt  but  you  may  do  well  enough,  come  in  my  Lads, 
come  in.  Crispianus  and  his  Brother,  with  great  Reverence  gave  her 
Thanks;  and  by  that  time  they  had  stayed  a  little  while,  down  came 
the  Good-man,  and  his  Wife  hard  by  his  Heels,  saying.  Husband,  these 
be  the  Youths  I  told  you  of,  no  doubt  but  in  time  they  wUl  be  good 

Men. 

Her  Husband  looking  very  wishfully  upon  them,  and  conceiving  a 
good  Opinion  of  their  Favours  at  length  agreed  that  they  should  dwell 
with  him,  so  that  they  would  be  bound  for  Seven  Years.  The  Youths 
being  contented,  the  Bargin  was  soon  ended,  and  so  set  to  their  Busi- 
ness; whereat  they  were  no  sooner  settled,  but  that  great  Search  was 
made  for  them  in  all  Places;  and  accordingly  the  Officers  came  to 
the  House  where  they  dwelt,  but  by  reason  of  their  Disguise,  they 
knew  them  not,  having  also  taken  upon  them  borrowed  Names  of 
Crispianus  and  Crispine. 

They  both  bent  their  whole  Minds  to  please  their  Master  and  Dame, 
refusing  nothing  that  was  put  'em  to  do;  whether  it  to  was  Dishes, 
scour  Kettles,  or  any  other  thing  whereby  they  thought  their  Dame's 
Favour  might  be  gotten,  which  made  her  the  readier  to  give  them  a 
good  Report  to  their  Master,  and  to  do  them  any  other  Service,  which 
otherwise  they  should  have  missed ;  following  therein  the  Admonition 
of  an  old  Journey-man,  who  would  aways  say  to  the  Apprentices: 

However  Things  do  frame, 

Please  well  thy  Master,  but  chiefly  thy  Dame. 


APPENDICES  261 

Now  by  that  time  these  two  young  Princes  had  truly  served  their 
Master  the  space  of  Four  or  Five  Years,  he  was  grown  somewhat 
wealthy,  and  they  very  Cunning  in  their  Trade,  whereby  the  House 
had  the  Name  to  breed  the  best  Workmen  in  the  Country,  which 
Report  in  the  end,  preferred  their  Master  to  be  the  Emperor's  Shooe- 
maker;  and  by  this  Means  his  Servants  went  to  Maximinus's  Court 
every  Day;  but  Crispianus  and  Crispine  fearing  they  should  be  known, 
kept  themselves  from  thence  as  much  as  they  could ;  Notwithstanding 
at  the  last,  perswading  that  Time  had  worn  them  out  of  Knowledge, 
they  were  willing  in  the  end  to  go  thither,  as  well  to  hear  Tydings  of 
Queen  their  Mother,  as  also  seek  their  own  Preferment. 


XXXI 

A  French  Story  of  the  Berth  and  Training  of  St.  Crispin 

AND  HIS  Brother  ^ 

Undoubtedly  the  first  shoemakers  who  obtained  anything  like  a 
general  reputation  were  the  famous  brothers  Crispin  and  Crispianus, 
who  are  said  to  have  lived  in  the  third  century  of  our  era.  These  saints 
have  been  regarded  almost  ever  since  that  early  time  as  the  tutelary  or 
patron  saints  of  shoemakers,  who  are,  to  tell  the  truth,  not  a  little 
proud  of  their  romantic  title,  "  the  sons  of  Crispin."  We  must  be  care- 
ful how  we  speak  of  these  saints,  for  it  seems  to  be  an  open  question 
whether  the  story  of  their  holy  self-denying  lives  and  martyr-deaths  be 
true  or  false.  If  the  main  features  of  the  story  be  true,  they  have  been 
greatly  distorted  by  fable.  We  give  the  story  as  it  is  generally  reported. 

SS.  Crispin  and  Crispianus  were  born  in  Rome.  Having  become 
converts  to  Christianity,  they  set  out  with  St.  Denis  from  that  city  to 
become  preachers  of  the  Gospel,  traveled  on  foot  through  Italy,  and 
finally  settled  down  at  a  Httle  town,  now  called  Soissons,  in  the  modern 
department  of  Aisne,  about  fifty  or  sixty  miles  to  the  north-east  of 
Paris.  Here  they  are  said  to  have  devoted  their  time  during  the  day  to 
preaching,  and  to  have  maintained  themselves  by  working  during  most 
of  the  night  as  shoemakers.  This  they  did  on  the  apostolic  model  of 
Paul,  who,  while  he  carried  on  his  mission  as  a  preacher,  maintained 
himself  by  his  trade  as  a  tent-maker,  that  he  might  be  "chargeable  to 
no  man."  Very  little  more  can  be  told  of  the  life  of  these  saintly  shoe- 

*  Quoted  from  Winks:  Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers,  pp.  197-198. 


262  APPENDICES 

makers  than  this;  but  this,  surely,  is  a  great  deal.  The  story  goes  that 
they  suffered  martyrdom  by  the  order  of  Rictus  Varus,  governor  or 
consul  in  Belgic  Gaul,  during  the  persecution  under  Diocletian  and 
Maximinus,  on  the  25th  of  October,  287.  The  25th  of  October  is  still 
kept  in  honor  of  these  saints  in  some  parts  of  England  and  Wales,  and 
in  other  European  countries.  The  shoemakers  of  the  district  turn  out 
in  large  numbers  and  parade  the  streets,  headed  by  bands  of  music,  and 
accompanied  by  banners  on  which  are  emblazoned  the  emblems  of  the 
craft. 

It  is  difficult,  as  already  intimated,  to  tell  how  much  of  pure  legend 
has  been  imported  into  the  history  of  the  saints  of  Soissons.  One 
tradition  declares  them  to  have  been  of  noble  birth,  and  to  have 
adopted  their  humble  trade  entirely  for  Christian  and  charitable  pur- 
poses. Another  story  relates  how  they  furnished  the  poor  with  shoes 
at  a  very  low  price,  and  that,  in  order  to  replenish  their  stock,  and  as  a 
mark  of  divine  favor,  an  angel  came  to  them  by  night  with  supplies  of 
leather;  while  yet  another  fable,  not  very  creditable  to  their  morals, 
avows  that  Saint  Crispin  stole  the  leather,  so  that  he  might  be  able  to 
give  shoes  to  the  poor.  Hence  comes  the  term  Crispinades  to  denote 
charities  done  at  the  expense  of  other  people.  To  crown  all,  it  is 
averred  on  one  authority  that  after  suffering  a  horrible  death  by  the 
sword,  their  bodies  were  thrown  into  the  sea,  and  were  cast  ashore  at 
Romney  Marsh.  Such  tales  are  worthless,  except  as  indicating  the 
wide  extent  of  popularity  the  shoemakers  of  Soissons  secured  by  virtue 
of  their  piety  and  benevolence. 


XXXII 

The  Pious  Confraternity  of  Brother  Shoeivl^kers,  founded 

BY  Henry  Michael  Buch  ^  (Middle  of 

17th  Century) 

The  founder  of  this  society  was  Henry  Michael  Buch,  who  was 
known  throughout  Paris,  in  his  day  and  long  after,  as  Good  Henry. 

Henry  Michael  Buch  came  from  the  Duchy  of  Luxemburg,  where 
he  had  been  born,  and  where  his  parents,  who  were  day-laborers,  had 
brought  him  up  in  a  very  simple  manner.  As  a  child,  Buch  was  re- 
markably gifted  and  very  pious.  He  was  early  apprenticed  to  a  shoe- 
maker, and  was  accustomed  to  spend  his  Sundays  and  holidays  in 

»  Cf.  William  Edward  Winks:  Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers,  pp.  201-202. 


APPENDICES  263 

public  worship  or  private  devotion.  During  his  apprenticeship  he 
began  the  work  of  reform  among  the  members  of  his  own  craft,  for  his 
young  heart  was  grieved  to  see  them  living  in  ignorance  and  vice. 
EnHsting  the  help  of  the  more  serious  among  them  in  his  good  work, 
he  endeavored  to  instruct  the  apprentices  of  the  town  in  the  doctrines 
of  religion,  to  draw  them  away  from  the  alehouses  and  vicious  com- 
pany, and  to  persuade  them  to  spend  their  time  in  a  sensible  and 
profitable  manner.  Taking  the  patron  saints  of  the  trade  for  a  model, 
he  cultivated  habits  of  self-denial  and  beneficence,  went  always  meanly 
clad,  abandoned  luxuries  in  food  and  clothing,  and  frequently  gave 
away  his  own  garments  in  order  to  clothe  some  poor  brother  shoe- 
maker. While  at  Luxemburg  and  Messen,  he  lived  chiefly  on  bread  and 
water,  so  that  he  might  be  able  to  feed  the  hungry  and  destitute. 

Having  removed  to  Paris,  his  good  deeds  soon  attracted  the  atten- 
tion of  Gaston  John  Baptist,  Baron  of  Renti,  who  was  so  much  im- 
pressed by  the  shoemaker's  simphcity  of  manner,  inteUigence,  and 
missionary  zeal,  that  he  persuaded  Buch  to  establish  in  that  city  a 
confraternity  among  the  members  of  his  own  humble  craft  for  the  pur- 
pose of  instructing  them  in  the  principles  and  practices  of  a  holy  life. 
With  a  view  to  strengthen  his  hands  for  such  a  task,  the  freedom  of  the 
city  was  purchased  for  him,  and  means  were  supplied  him  for  starting 
in  business  as  a  master  shoemaker,  ''so  that  he  might  take  apprentices 
and  journeymen  who  were  willing  to  follow  the  rules  that  were  pre- 
scribed them."  ^ 

Seven  men  and  youths  having  joined  him  on  these  terms,  the  foun- 
dation of  his  Confraternity  was.  laid  in  1645,  Good  Henry  being  ap- 
pointed the  first  superior.^ 

Two  years  after  this,  the  tailors  of  the  city,  who  had  noticed  the 
conduct  of  the  shoemakers,  and  had  been  delighted  with  the  goodly 
spectacle  presented  in  their  happy  and  useful  lives,  resolved  to  follow 
the  example.  They  borrowed  a  copy  of  the  rules,  and  started  a  similar 
society  in  1647. 

These  brotherhoods,  but  notably  those  of  the  shoemakers,  were 
spread  through  France  and  Italy,  and  were  the  means  of  doing  an 
immense  amount  of  good  among  the  members  of  the  two  crafts. 

The  rules  of  the  fraternity  founded  by  Buch  were  assimilated  to 
certain  monastic  orders.  They  enjoined  rising  at  five  o'clock  and  meet- 

1  Butler's  "Lives  of  the  Primitive  Fathers,  Martyrs,  and  Saints,"  1799,  p.  S32. 
*  This  society  flourished  until  the  outbreak  of  the  French  Revolution,  1789, 
when  it  was  suppressed. 


264  APPENDICES 

ing  for  united  prayer  before  engaging  in  work,  prayers  ofifered  by  the 
superior  as  often  as  the  clock  strikes,  at  certain  hours  the  singing  of 
hymns  while  at  work,  at  other  times  silence  and  meditation;  meditation 
before  dinner,  the  reading  of  some  devotional  work  by  one  of  the  num- 
ber during  meals;  a  retreat  for  a  few  days  in  every  year;  assisting  on 
Sundays  and  holy  days  at  sermons  and  "  the  divine  office  ";  the  visita- 
tion of  the  poor  and  sick,  of  hospitals  and  prisons;  self-examination, 
followed  by  prayer  together  at  night  and  retiring  to  rest  at  nine 
o'clock. 


XXXIII 

The  Shooe-maker's  Glory 

BEING 

A  Merry  Song  in  the  Praise  of  Shooe-makers,  to  be  sung  by  them  every 

Year  on  the  2jth  of  October 

To  the  Tune  of,  The  Tyrant,  &c. 

In  the  Praise  of  the 

Shooe-makers  Trade  we'll  write, 
A  Merry  Song  is  to  be  sung 

on  October's  Twenty  fifth  Night. 
For  without  the  Shooe-maker 

we  shall  go  cold  of  our  Feet, 
To  preserve  the  Gentle-Craft 

therefore  it  is  meet. 
Then  sing  Boys,  and  drink,  Boys, 

and  cast  Care  away,  1 

For  the  honour  of  Shooe-makers, 

we'll  keep  Holiday. 

To  add  the  more  Lustre  unto  due  Merriment 

Our  Ancestors  came  of  a  Royal  Descent : 
Crispiana,  Crispinus,  and  Noble  St.  Hugh, 

Were  all  Sons  of  Kings,  this  is  known  to  be  true* 

Then  sing  Boys,  and  drink  Boys,  &c. 

Moreover  I  wou'd  have  you  thus  much  understand, 
That  the  chief  est  gay  Ladies,  and  Lords  of  our  Land, 

To  the  bonny  Shooemakers  beholding  must  be: 

Take  them  from  the  highest  to  the  lowest  Degree: 
Then  sing  Boys,  and  drink  Boys,  &c. 


APPENDICES  265 

And  now  for  St.  Hugh,  and  fair  Winifred's  sake, 
A  jovial  Bout  of  it,  we  purpose  to  make; 
In  the  Gulf  of  Oblivion  let  Sorrows  be  drown'd, 
Whilst  we  in  good  Fellowship  merrily  drink  round: 
Then  drink  Boys,  and  sing  Boys,  &c. 

Here's  a  Health  to  the  Muses,  which  furthers  Delight, 
And  helps  us  to  pass  away  long  Winter  Nights: 
With  Songs  and  with  Pastimes,  as  the  Season  doth  require, 
Whilst  we  soak  our  Noses  and  sit  by  the  Fire; 
Then  sing  Boys,  and  drink  Boys,  &c. 

The  next  cordial  Health,  to  speak  as  I  think. 
Shall  be  to  the  Brewer  that  makes  us  good  Drink; 
And  to  the  good  Butchers,  that  kills  us  good  Meat, 
That's  toothsome  and  wholesome  for  Christians  to  eat, 
Then  sing  Boys,  and  drink  Boys,  &c. 

Here's  to  the  bonny  Weavers,  and  Glovers  also. 
For  they  are  our  Neighbours  and  Men  that  we  know; 
And  to  Vulcan  the  Blacksmith  that  blowest  the  Bellows, 
For  he  is  accounted  the  King  of  Goodfellows; 
Then  sing  Boys,  and  drink  Boys,  Src. 

Here's  to  the  Taylor,  that  never  meant  harm, 
For  he  makes  us  Cloathing  to  keep  our  Bones  warm. 
And  a  Health  to  the  Tanner  that  dresseth  our  Leather, 
For  they  are  the  Men  that  must  hold  us  together. 
Then  sing  Boys,  and  drink  Boys,  &c. 

And  now  to  conclude  all,  and  finish  my  Song, 

Let's  drink  up  our  Drink,  and  do  no  Body  wrong: 
'Tis  late  in  the  Night,  Sirs,  therefore  let  us  pay 
Our  Reckoning,  and  then  we'll  be  jogging  away; 
Another  Time  when  we  do  meet  here  again, 
We'U  make  a  merry  Bout  for  an  Hour  or  twain. 

Reprinted  in  The  Delightful  and  Princely  History  of  the  Gentle-Craft,  pp.  165- 
166. 

XXXIV 

Brothers  of  St.  Crispin 

Brothers  of  St.  Crispin  were  so  well  known  in  Elizabethan  times 
that  Shakespeare  ventured  to  devote  several  lines  to  them  at  a  most 
vital  point  in  King  Henry  Fifth's  address  to  the  leaders  of  the  English 
forces  just  before  the  Battle  of  Agincourt  (Act  V,  Sc.  3),  knowing  he 
had  many  shoemakers  in  his  audience. 


266  APPENDICES 

This  day  is  called  the  feast  of  Crispin. 

And  Crispin  Crispian  shall  ne'er  go  by, 
From  this  day  to  the  ending  of  the  world, 
But  we  in  it  shall  be  remembered. 
We  few,  we  happy  few,  we  band  of  brothers. 

Unfortunately  for  the  shoemaker  fame,  the  thousands  of  boys  and 
girls  in  High  School  today  and  the  great  majority  of  grown  men  and 
women  who  hear  the  lines  on  the  stage  each  year,  have  no  connotation 
with  St.  Crispin,  so  brief  was  the  revival  of  the  Order  of  St.  Crispin 
and  so  entirely  local  were  its  interests  and  effects. 

XXXV 

New  Help^ 

No  member  of  this  order  shall  teach  or  aid  in  teaching  any  part  or 
parts  of  boot  or  shoe  making,  unless  this  Lodge  shall  give  permission 
by  a  three-fourths  vote  of  those  present,  and  voting  when  such  per- 
mission is  first  asked.  Provided  this  article  shall  not  be  so  construed  as 
to  prevent  a  father  teaching  his  own  son.  Provided,  also,  that  this 
article  shall  not  be  so  construed  as  to  hinder  any  member  of  this 
organization  from  learning  any  or  all  parts  of  the  trade. 

XXXVI 

Ritual  of  the  Degree  of  ...  in  the  Order  of  the  Knights 
OF  St.  Crispin,  Temple  of  .  .  .  Boston,  1870 

Obligation 

You  each  and  all  solemnly  and  sincerely  pledge  yourself,  your  sacred 
word  and  honor,  that  you  wUl,  under  no  circumstances,  divulge  any  of 
the  secrets  of  this  Temple  to  any  person  whom  you  do  not  know  to  be  a 
member  of  the  Temple  of  which  you  are  a  member,  and  whose  standing 
is  good  (except  your  religious  confessor);  that  you  will  not  make 
known  any  signs,  pass-words,  tests,  or  any  other  work  of  the  Temple. 
You  also  pledge  yourself  to  bear  true  and  faithful  allegiance  to  the 
Order  of  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin,  and  obey  and  enforce  its  con- 

'  Constitution  of  the  Subordinate  Lodges  of  the  Order  K.O.S.C.,  Article  X. 


APPENDICES  267 

stitutional  rules  and  obligations,  to  the  best  of  your  power  and  ability, 
by  all  proper  means;  and  you  also  agree  to  do  all  you  can  to  persuade 
all  true  and  loyal  Crispins  to  join  this  Temple,  and  unite  in  this  work  of 
protecting  and  elevating  labor.  All  this  you  promise  freely  of  your  own 
accord,  and  without  any  mental  reservation  whatsoever.  You  also 
agree  to  be  governed  by  the  will  of  the  Temple  expressed  in  the  man- 
ner provided  in  the  Constitution.  This  obligation  you  agree  to  keep 
inviolate,  as  long  as  these  Temples  exist. 

All  this  you  promise,  on  honor  before  God  and  these  witnesses,  who 
will  bear  swift  witness  against  you  should  you  prove  false. 


XXXVII 

The  Crispins  at  Burrell  &  Maguire's  Factory 

Workmen  in  Randolph  say  that  the  Crispin  demands  threatened  the 
profits  of  Burrell  &  Maguire.  Business  men  say  that  when  the  Aus- 
tralian trade  ^  died  out  in  the  late  6o's,  that  the  Burrell  &  Maguire 
market  "went  flat."  A  third  explanation  which  is  more  significant, 
is  found  in  the  fact  that  Mr.  Maguire  was  undeniably  a  Copperhead 
and  his  son  James  Frank  Maguire,  the  former  American  Consul  at 
Melbourne,  was  one  also.  Both  men  at  the  close  of  the  war  found 
themselves  in  the  midst  of  strong  Union  sentiment  which  may  have 
vitally  affected  their  business.  The  following  item  from  a  bit  of  faded 
yellow  newspaper  has  come  into  my  hands: 

The  Pirate  Shenandoah.  A  private  letter  from  Melbourne,  Feb.  24,  thus 
speaks  of  the  visit  of  the  rebel  pirate  Shenandoah  to  that  place: 

The  Confederate  war  pirate  Shenandoah  has  been  in  Hobson's  Bay  about 
a  month.  The  officers  have  been  lionized  and  feted  all  over  the  town  and 
country.  You  would  scarcely  believe  there  were  so  many  "secesh"  here  as 
there  are.  They  gave  them  a  public  dinner  here  and  in  Bellarat.  J.  F.  Ma- 
guire, late  American  Consul,  showed  them  the  most  attention.  We  tried  to 
blow  her  up,  but  could  not  get  a  chance. 

There  is  to  me  a  fourth  explanation,  i.e.,  that  both  members  of  the 
firm,  and  their  agent  in  Australia  had  all  become  wealthy  and  inter- 
ested in  other  investments  by  1872,  so  that  the  pressure  of  the  Cris- 
pins at  just  the  opening  of  hard  times  in  1873,  was  the  straw  that 
decided  the  firm  to  retire  from  the  shoe  business  since  they  could  do  it 
with  comfortable  fortunes. 

*  I  presume  they  mean  the  early  monopoly  of  it. 


SOURCES 

A.  Primary  Sources.*    Oral 

Barnes,  Dow Frenchtown,  Pa. 

Batcheller,  Francis North  Brookfield,  Mass. 

Belcher,  Fred  L Randolph,  Mass. 

Belcher,  Joseph Randolph,  Mass. 

Belcher,  Mary  E Randolph,  Mass. 

Belcher,  Stephen Randolph,  Mass. 

Brown,  Richmond South  Hanson,  Mass. 

Brown,  Lucy South  Hanson,  Mass. 

Cole,  Abbie Warren,  Rhode  Island 

Cooper,  James  H Brockton,  Mass. 

Cox,  Samuel Lynn,  Mass. 

Crocker,  Henry  P Raynham,  Mass. 

Felch,  Henry Natick,  Mass. 

Felch,  Isaac Natick,  Mass. 

Field,  John  H Randolph,  Mass. 

Fletcher,  Jerome  C Littleton,  New  Hampshire,  and  later 

of  Brockton,  Mass. 
Gilmore,  Cassander  Raynham,  Mass. 

Holmes,  Sumner North  Brookfield,  Mass. 

Jones,  Asa Nantucket,  Mass. 

Leach,  George  Myron Raynham,  Mass. 

Littlefield,  Cyrus. Avon  (then  East  Stoughton),  Mass. 

Malloy,  James Randolph,  Mass. 

Martin,  Benjamin Bristol,  Rhode  Island 

Puffer,  Loren  W Brockton,  Mass. 

Spinney,  Benjamin  F Lynn,  Mass. 

Tirrell,  Henry  A East  Weymouth,  Mass. 

Tucker,  Nathan Avon,  Mass. 

Twitchell,  Henry  W Brookfield,  Mass. 

Wales,  Charles  W Randolph,  Mass. 

Whitcomb,  Joseph Holbrook  (then  East  Randolph),  Mass. 

White,  Samuel Randolph,  Mass. 

Worthley,  Hiram  S Strong,  Me.,  and  later  of  Concord, 

Mass. 

B.  Primary  Sources.    Manuscript 

1.  Allen  Papers  in  American  Antiquarian  Society  Library,  at  Worcester, 
Mass.    Letters  of  Captain  Thomas  Willson. 

2.  Batcheller  Papers.  Account  books  of  Ezra  and  Tyler  Batcheller  and 
successors,  wxitten  from  1832  to  1875.  At  present,  these  are  stored  in 
North  Brookfield,  Mass.,  in  the  guardianship  of  Mr.  Francis  Batcheller. 

'  All  of  these  people  quoted  as  primary  sources  were  bom  from  eighty  to  one  hundred  years  ago. 
Each  of  them  has  added  definitely  to  the  infonnation  given  in  these  pages. 

268 


SOURCES  269 

3.  Belcher  Books.  Exercise  Book  of  1793  and  an  account  book  from  1807- 
1844.  Written  in  Brookville  (South  Randolph),  Mass.,  by  Ebenezer 
Belcher,  and  given  by  his  son's  widow  to  the  Harvard  University 
Archives. 

4.  Breed  Books.  Account  books  of  Amos  Breed  of  Lynn,  Mass.  Written 
1763-1796,  and  now  preserved  in  the  Lynn  Historical  Collection. 

5.  Howard  and  French  Books.  Account  books,  including  day  books  and 
ledgers  written  from  1849-1855  in  the  offices  of  the  Howard  and  French 
Company  of  Randolph,  Mass.     Now  owned  by  Blanche  E.  Hazard. 

6.  Kimball  and  Robinson  Papers.  Written  in  North  Brookfield,  Mass., 
1858.  Owned  in  1908  by  Henry  Emmons  Twitchell  and  stored  in  his 
attic  in  North  Brookfield,  Mass. 

7.  Reed  Account  Book.  Written  in  17 29-1 763  by  George  Reed  of  Dighton, 
Mass.     Now  owned  by  Miss  Julia  Gilmore  of  Raynham,  Mass. 

8.  Reed  Papers.  Account  books,  letters,  bills,  receipts,  bills  of  lading  and 
invoices  belonging  to  Harvey  and  Quincy  Reed  of  South  Weymouth, 
Mass.,  covering  the  years  1809-1838.  Preserved  by  Quincy  Reed,  Jr., 
of  South  Weymouth,  Mass.,  in  1908. 

9.  Robinson  and  Company  Accoimt  Book  of  1848-1854.  Written  at  Lynn, 
Mass.,  and  preserved  in  the  Lynn  Historical  Society  Collection. 

10.  Skinner  and  Ward  Store  Books.  Written  from  1813-1815  in  North 
Brookfield,  Mass. 

1 1 .  Southworth  Papers.  Accounts  kept  by  Jedediah  Southworth  in  Stough- 
ton,  Mass.,  1811-1814.  Owned  now  by  Loren  W.  Puffer  of  Brockton, 
Mass. 

12.  Tobin  Letter.  Written  in  1916  about  the  History  of  the  order  of  St. 
Crispin.    Owned  by  Blanche  E.  Hazard. 

13.  Twitchell  Account  and  Order  Books  for  1861-1865,  kept  by  Henry  E. 
Twitchell  in  North  Brookfield,  Mass. 

14.  Wendell  Papers.  Letters,  bills  and  receipts,  account  books  and  mem- 
oranda recording  the  business  transactions  of  John  Wendell  in  Ports- 
mouth, New  Hampshire,  including  the  years  1 802-1804.  Owned  and 
carefully  filed  by  Mr.  Barrett  Wendell  of  Boston,  Mass. 

15.  White  and  Whitcomb  Account  Book.  Kept  in  East  Randolph,  Mass., 
in  1833.  Preserved  by  Joseph  Whitcomb  in  1908-1912  at  his  Raynham 
home. 

16.  Wilson  Account  Book  for  1846.  Written  and  owned  by  Mr.  Henry 
Wilson  of  Natick,  Mass.  Now  preserved  by  Mr.  Louis  Coolidge, 
Treasurer  of  the  United  Shoe  Machinery  Company,  Boston,  Mass. 

C.  Primary  Sources.    Printed 

I.   Autobiographical,  biographical  and  historical. 

Bryant,  Seth:   Shoe  and  Leather  Trade  for  one  hundred  Years. 

Ashmont,  Mass.,  in  1891. 
Howe-Singer-Leavitt   Machine   Controversy.     First   hand   reports, 

printed  in  the  Sewing  Machine  Journal  of  April  25  and  May  25, 

1904;  February  10,  July  10,  and  July  25,  1911. 


270  SOURCES 

Johnson,  David  N. :  Sketches  of  Lynn  or  The  Changes  of  Fifty  Years. 

Lynn,  Mass.,  T.  P.  Nichols,  1880. 
Johnson,  Edward:  Wonder  Working  Providence  of  Sion's  Savior  in 

New  England.     1654. 
Larcom,  Lucy:  New  England  Girlhood.    Boston,  Houghton  Mifflin 

Company,  1884. 
Larcom,  Lucy :  Hannah  Binding  Shoes  (a  poem) .   Boston,  Houghton 

MifiBin  Company,  1884. 
Porter,  J.  W.:  Literviews  with  Quincy  Reed  in  1885.    Published  in 

the  Bangor  Historical  Magazine,  Vol.  I,  August,  1885. 

2.  Documentary. 

Charter  of  the  Boston  Shoemakers  of  1648.   Reprinted  in  the  Records 

of  the  Colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay  in  New  England,  Vol.  HI,  p. 

132. 
Constitution  of  the  Knights  of  St.  Crispin.    Printed  in  the  University 

of  Wisconsin  Economic  Series,  Bulletin  No.  355,  The  Knights  of 

St.  Crispin,  written  by  Don  D.  Lescohier.    Madison,  Wisconsin, 

July,  1910. 
Speeches  of  the  Chief  Knight  and  of  the  International  Grand  Scribe 

of  the  Order  of  St.  Crispin,  1870  and  1872.    Reprinted  in  the  above 

bulletin. 

3.  Public  Records. 

Annals  of  Congress.    Tariff  Debates,  1834. 
Massachusetts  Census  of  1855,  1865,  1875.     (Tables.) 
Suffolk  County  Records  for  1757. 
United  States  Census  of  i860.     (Tables.) 

4.  Newspapers  and  Advertising  Cards. 

(a)  Cards  to  advertise  sailing  of  vessels.  (Collection  preserved  by 
Augusta  B.  Wales  of  Randolph,  Mass.) 

ib)  Files  1  of  the  Boston  Gazette,  1754-1764;  Charleston  Gazette, 
1783;  City  Gazette  (of  Charleston,  S.  C),  1790;  Hampshire 
Gazette,  1789;  Hide  and  Leather  Interest,  May,  1869;  Lynn 
Reporter,  1857;  Massachusetts  Spy,  1771,  1773;  Middlesex 
Gazette,  1795;  Newburyport  Herald,  1857;  Peimsylvania  Ga- 
zette, 1771;  Randolph  Transcript,  1857;  Salem  Gazette,  1795; 
Salem  Mercury,  1787;  South  CaroUna  Gazette,  1784;  Worcester 
Gazette,  1798,  1799. 

D.  Secondary  Sources.    Printed 

1.  Bacon,  Oliver  N.:  History  of  Natick  from  its  Settlement  in  1651  to  the 

Present  Time.    Boston,  Damrell  and  Moore,  1856. 

2.  Barber,  John  Warner:  Historical  Collections  of  every  town  in  Massa- 

chusetts.   Worcester,  Dorr,  Howland  and  Company,  1839. 

3.  Biicher,  Karl:    Die  Entstehung  der  Volkswirtschaft.     Third  edition, 

Leipzig,  1900.    EngUsh  translation  by  Wickett.    Boston,  Henry  Holt 
and  Company,  191 2. 

'  This  list  includes  only  the  papers  quoted,  as  typical  of  the  files  consulted. 


SOURCES  271 

4.  Commons,  John  K.:    American  Shoemakers.     (Quarterly  Journal  of 

Economics,  November,  1909.) 

5.  Delightful,  Princely  and  Entertaining  History  of  the  Gentlecraft  of 

Shoemakers.    London,  1725. 

6.  Hall,  J.  Sparkes:  History  of  Boots  and  Shoes,  and  Biographical  Sketches. 

New  York,  William  H.  Graham,  1847. 

7.  Hurd,  Duane  H.:  History  of  Middlesex  County.    3  vols.    Philadelphia, 

Pa.,  J.  M.  Lewis  and  Company,  1890. 

8.  Kingman,  Bradford:  History  of  North  Bridgewater.    Boston,  1866. 

9.  Lescohier,  Don  D.:  The  Knights  of  St.  Crispin.    Published  in  Univer- 

sity of  Wisconsin  Series,  Bulletin  No.  355,  Madison,  Wisconsin,  1910. 

10.  Lewis  and  Newhall:  History  of  Lynn.     Boston,  Samuel  W.  Dickinson, 

1844.  ^ 

11.  Proceedings  of  the  150th  Anniversary  of  the  First  Congregational 

Church,  Randolph,  Mass.    Published  in  Randolph,  1893. 

12.  Rehe,  Carl:   Beitrag  zur  Geschichte  der  mechanischen  Schuhfabrika- 

tion,  pp.  185-214  (in  Beitr.  z.  Gesch.  der  Technik  u.  Industrie),  vol. 
3,  BerUn,  1911. 

13.  Roberts,  James  A.:  New  York  in  the  Revolution  as  Colony  and  State. 

Records  discovered  and  arranged  by  James  A.  Roberts.     Albany, 
N.  Y.,  1897. 

14.  Temple,  Josiah  H. :  History  of  North  Brookfield,  Mass.,  preceded  by  an 

account  of  Old  Quabaug.    Brookfield  Records  1686-1783.  Published 
by  the  town,  1887. 

15.  United  States  Department  of  Labor:  Wages  and  Hours  of  Labor  in  the 

Boot  and  Shoe  Ladustry.    Bulletin  No.  134  of  the  U.  S.  Bureau  of 
Labor  Statistics. 

16.  Unwin,  George:  Industrial  Organization  in  the  Sixteenth  and  Seven- 

teenth Centuries.     Oxford,  Clarendon  Press,  1904. 

17.  Winks,  William  E.:    Lives  of  Illustrious  Shoemakers.     New  York, 

Funk  and  Wagnalls,  1883. 


INDEX 


INDEX^ 


Soman  figures  refer  to  the  preface;  Arabic  to  the  text. 

Whenever  a  subject  is  treated  in  a  footnote  as  well  as  in  the  text,  the  text  alone  is  indicated. 

Subjects  not  found  among  the  headings  should  be  sought  among  the  subheads  under  Human  element 

and  Stages  of  production. 
The  following  abbreviations  are  used: 

n.  I,  n.  2,  etc.,  indicates  the  number  of  the  note. 

Ho  means  Home  stage. 

Ha  means  Handicraft  stage. 

D,  Di,  etc.,  means  Domestic  stage,  the  figure  indicating  the  Phase. 

F,  Ft,  etc.,  means  Factory  stage,  the  figure  indicating  the  Phase. 

KSC  means  Knights  of  St.  Crispin. 


Abington,  a  shoe  town, 
in  early  days,  178. 
in  D,  52,  72,  100  n.  i,  209. 
in  F,  117-119,  141, 147  n.  3,  153. 
Alden    family   of    Randolph,   entrepre- 
neurs throughout  D,  18  n.  i,  19, 
45,  46,  50,  99  n.  I,  108  n.  I,  117 
n.  I. 
Apprentices,    see   Human  element,  ap- 
prentices. 
Australia,  sale  of  Massachusetts  made 
shoes  in, 
in  D3,  81,  83. 

in  Fi,  98-101,  103,  107,  no  n.  i,  267. 
Avon  (formerly  E.  Stoughton),  a  shoe 
town,  48  n.  2,  50-52,  62. 

Bacon,  Oliver,  History  of  Natick,  220. 

Baker,  Virginia,  The  Answer  la  Abiel 
Kingsbury's  Prayer,  6  n.  i. 

Baltimore,  99  n.  i,  108  n.  i,  196. 

Barber,  John  W. ,  Historical  Collections  of 
Massachusetts,  66,  207-212. 

BatcheUer  family  of  North  Brookfield, 
entrepreneurs  throughout  D  and 
in  F,  22, 49  n.  2, 50, 55-59, 63, 113, 
116  n.  I,  122,  123,  200-207,  246- 
255- 


Belcher,  Ebenezer,  a  shoemaker-farmer 

of  D2,  20  n.  2,  27,  45-48,  52. 
Blake,  Lyman  R. ,  inventor  of  the  McKay 
machine,  v  n.  2,   in,   117,   245, 
246. 
Boston, 

in  Ho  and  Ha,  10-14,  i74,  i77.  182, 

189. 
in  D, 28, 29  n.  3,  67,  135,  196, 209, 211. 
in  F,  99,  103,  105-109,  n9,  141,  150, 

151,  154- 
Braintree,  parent  town  of  Randolph,  46, 

176-178,  182,  208. 
See  also  Randolph;  S.  Randolph. 
Breed  family  of  Lynn,  entrepreneurs  of 

Di,  28  n.  I,  37-39,  79,  179  n-  2, 

185-187. 
Bridges,   Edmund,   English   shoemaker 

who  came  to  Lynn  in  i6js,  23, 

131- 
Bridgewater  (including  Joppa),  52,  59, 
61,  177,  182,  209. 
See    also    Brockton    (North    Bridge- 
water)  ;  S.  Bridgewater. 
Brockton  (formerly  North  Bridgewater), 
a  shoe  town, 
earl^  conditions  in,  vi  n.  i,  17,  19,  20, 
179  n.  I,  180, 181. 


1  This  index  is  the  work  of  Mr.  Karl  W.  Bigelow,  Instructor  in  Economics  at  Cornell  University. 

275 


276 


INDEX 


in  D,  20,  67  n.  2,  73,  77,  9i>  ^35  "•  2, 

138,  140,  209. 
in  F,  99,  118,  119,  139,  141,  144  n.  i. 
See  also  Bridgewater;  N.  Bridgewater. 
Brogans  specialized  in  by  certain  locali- 
ties, 80,  81,  114,  139- 
Brookfield  (formerly  Quabaug),  a  shoe 
town, 
early  conditions  in,  21,  22,  179  n.  i, 

181,  182. 
in  D,  22, 49  n.  2,  50,  S5-S9i  72, 81, 133, 

134,  174-176,  200,  210,  212. 
in  F,  98,  113-117,  122,  123,  246. 
Brown,  Lucy  (Mrs.  Richmond),  a  con- 
tented rapid  stitcher  of  F,   140, 
141. 
Bryant,  Seth,  wholesale  shoe  dealer  of 

D2,  59-63,  117-119- 
Shoe  and  Leather  Trade  for  One  Hun- 
dred Years,2L  source  of  information 
regarding  Ha  and  early  D,  14  n.  2. 
See  also  Mitchell  and  Bryant. 

Buch,  Henry  Michael,  founder  of  the 
Pious  Confraternity  of  Brother 
Shoemakers,  17th  century,  262- 
264. 

Biicher,  Karl,  confirmation  of  views  of, 
vii,  176  n.  2. 

Burrell  and  Maguire's  factory  at  Ran- 
dolph, 99,  100  n.  2,  loi,  no  n.  I, 
153,  267. 


California,  72,  81,  83,  95,  98-101,  103, 

107. 
Campello,  see  Brockton. 
Carey,  Dr.  William,  an  English  bagman, 

258. 
Carver,   T.   N.,   Organization   of  Rural 

Interests    (in    Yearbook    of    the 

Dept.  of  Agriculture,  1914),  i77 

n.  5- 
Central  shop,  see  Stages  of  Production 

(D2,  D3,  Fi)  shops  in,  central. 
Charleston  (S.  C),  a  distribution  point 

for   Massachusetts   made    shoes, 

35- 
Chicago,  104  n.  4,  151,  152. 


Clark,  Amasa,  agent  for  Howard  and 

French  for  local  trade  in  D3,  45 

n.  4,  83,84,  221-225. 
Cochato,  see  Randolph. 
Commercial  life,  effect  of  on  economic 

life,  16. 
Commons,  John  R.,  writings  of,  referred 

to,  142  n.  I,  143  n.  I. 
Connor,  Nichols,  inventor  of  binder,  79. 
Cox,  Samuel,  of  Lynn,  marginal  worker 

of  D,  144  n.  2. 
Crispianus,  brother  of  St.  Crispin,  130, 

258-262,  264. 
Crispins,  see  Human  element,  KSC 
Crocker,  Henry  P. ,  source  of  information 

regarding  transition  to  F,  92  n.  i, 

IIS- 
Cummings,  S.  P.,  International  Grand 

Scribe  of  KSC,  154-156- 
Customers,  see  Stages  of  Production(  Ha, 
D3),  customers. 

Dagyr,  John  Adam,  Welsh  shoemaker 
who  came  to  Lynn  in  1750,  29,  78, 
131. 

Daniels,  Newell,  organizer  of  KSC,  145, 

147,  152,  153- 
Danvers,  72,  210,  212. 
Delightful,    Princely,    and    Entertaining 

History   of  the    Gentlecraft,    The, 

169,  170,  258  n.  2,  265. 
Deming  and  Edwards,  North  Brookfield 

firm,  58,  59,  82  n.  2. 
Dighton,  174. 
Drew,  Samuel,  shoemaker  metaphysician 

of  England,  133,  134,  256,  257. 

East  Middleboro,  see  Middleboro. 

East  Stoughton,  see  Avon  (present  name 
of  town). 

Economic  conditions  of  early  Massachu- 
setts, brief  summary  of,  15-23. 

Economic  life,  affected  by  commercial 
and  industrial  conditions,  16. 

Eddy  and  Leach,  typical  partnership  of 
capitalist  and  shoemaker  in  D3, 
71,  72,  115,  139. 


INDEX 


277 


England, 

industrial  history  of,  26,  27. 

leather  imported  from  in  D,  30. 
Essex  county,  a  centre  for  boot  and  shoe 

industry,  67,  81,  113,  210-212. 
Europe,  evolution  of  industry  in,  15. 


Factories,  see  Stages  of  Production 
(D3,  Fi,  F2),  factories  in.  Do- 
mestic and  Factory  stages. 

Felch  family  of  Natick,  early  entre- 
preneurs of  D2,  v^^,  54,  217  n.  2. 

Field,  Josiah,  the  Randolph  bagman,  11, 
135,  258. 

Financial  history  of  four  Massachusetts 
shoe  centres,  early,  176-183. 

Fletcher,  Jerome  C,  source  of  informa- 
tion regarding  Ho,  5  n.  i,  150  n.  i. 

French,  see  Howard  and  French. 

Georgetown,  72. 

Gilds,  see  Human  element,  gilds. 

Gilmore,  C.  and  A.  H.,  of  Raynham, 

factory  owners,  92  n.  i,  102,  iio- 

112,  114,  230,  231. 
Grafton,  55,  72,  200,  201,  209. 

Hall,  J.  Sparkes,  History  oj  Boots  and 
Shoes,  128,  256  n.  i,  258  n.  i. 

Hathaway,  Paul,  belated  itinerant  shoe- 
maker, 134,  135,  138. 

Haverhill,  a  shoe  town, 

in  D,  78,  83,  190,  198,  210,  212. 
in  F,  105,  112. 

Hemenway,  Augustus,  developer  of 
South  American  trade,  62,  63. 

Holbrook,  49. 

HoUiston,  59,  208,  211. 

Hopkinton,  72,  208,  211. 

Howard,  Daniel  S.,  creator  of  the 
"good  low-priced  shoe,"  119. 

Howard  and  French's  factory  at  Ran- 
dolph, 83-92,  99  n. I,  loi,  119, 
217  n.  I,  221-230. 

Howe,  Elias,  inventor  of  the  sewing- 
machine,  v  n.  2,  93. 


HUMAN  ELEMENT  in  boot  and  shoe 
industry,  127-156. 
apprentices, 

in  old  countries,  128,  256,  258,  260, 

263. 
in  Ha,  10-12,  132. 
in  Di  and  D2,  25,  32,  33,  47,  134, 

135,  193,  201. 
scarcity  of  in  D3  and  F,  86,  95,  143, 

154- 

bagmen,  128,  135,  258. 

Boot  and  Shoe  Workers'  Union,  The, 
developed  in  F2,  156. 

Boston  Gild  of  1650,  The,  a  shoe- 
makers' organization,  142,  143, 
170-173. 

Brothers  of  St.  Crispin,  The,  an  Eng- 
lish gild  of  Shakespeare's  day, 
265,  266. 

child  labor,  70,  80. 

See    also    Human    element,    young 
people  as  shoeworkers. 

"closed  shop," 

not  attempted  by  Boston  Gild  of 

1650,  142. 
rise  of  feeling  for  in  Fi,   144-146, 
148,  149,  154, 155- 

cobblers,  see  Human  element,  shoe 
workers. 

Company  of  Shoemakers,  The,  see 
Human  element,  Boston  Gild. 

cordwainers,  see  Human  element,  shoe 
workers. 

division  of  labor,  see  Stages  of  produc- 
tion (Ha,  Di,  D2,  D3,  Fi,  and 
F2),  specialization. 

family  as  working  unit,  70,  71. 

Federal  Society  of  Journeymen  Cord- 
wainers, The,  an  organization 
never  existing  in  Massachusetts, 
142  n.  I. 

foreigners  instruct  American  shoe- 
makers in  craft,  28,  29. 

gilds,  very  few  in  Ha,  10. 

grievances  in  Fi,  140,  141. 

See  also  Human  element,  strikes. 

hours  of  employment,  88,  98,  112. 

immigrants  as  apprentices,  32. 


278 


INDEX 


HUMAN  ELEMENT  {continued) 
itinerant  cobblers,  see  Human  element, 

shoe  workers,  itinerant, 
journeymen, 

in  old  countries,  133,  135  n.  2,  256- 

258,  263. 
in  Ho  and  Ha,  6,  10,  12,  128,  142, 

185,  186  n.  3. 
in  D,  25,  zz,  34,  47,  80,  134,  i93- 
inF,  141,  143-145- 

Knights  of  St.  Crispin,  The,  a  shoe 
workers'  organization  existing 
1868-1874,  142-156. 

accomplishments  of,  156. 

attitude  of,  towards  members  who 
became  foremen  and  entrepre- 
neurs, 147  n.  I,  148,  152, 153. 

Chief  Knight's  speech  quoted,  151, 

152. 
Constitution    of,   referred     to    and 

quoted,  145,  146,  148  n.  2,  n.  3, 

149  n.  I,  n.  2,  n.  3,  266. 
decline  of,  155,  156. 
demands  of,  145. 
discussed    by    old    shoe    workers, 

140. 
discussion  of  politics  and  religion 

taboo  in  lodges,  149. 
dues  of,  troubles  in  connection  with, 

147-149- 

See  also  Human  element,  KSC, 
finances, 
duties  of  members,  148,  149. 
effect  of  name  of,  on  shoe  workers, 

145- 
effects  of,  on  boot  and  shoe  industry, 

153-155,  267. 
enthusiasm,  lack  of  a  fatal  defect, 

147,  150-153- 
finances  of,  a  great  problem,  150- 

152,155- 

See  also  Human  element,  KSC, 
dues. 
inflexibility  of  views,  153. 
instability  in  action,  153. 
internal  dissension,  151. 
membership,  145-147. 


new  members,  endeavors  to  win, 
149. 

not  taken  very  seriously,  153, 154. 

number  of  lodges  in  Massachusetts, 
147. 

numbers  of  Massachusetts  shoe 
workers  joining,  145. 

objects  of,  145-147. 

panic  of  1873's  effect  on,  156. 

problems  of  industry  not  appre- 
ciated by,  141,  142. 

problems  of  Massachusetts  lodges, 

150-153- 
Proceedings  of  quoted,  145. 
requirements    for    membership    in, 

148. 
rites  of,  147,  148,  266,  267. 
rules  of,  inadequate,  147. 
scabbing,  attitude  towards,  146, 148. 
sources  of  information  concerning, 

145,  146. 

strike  expenses  of,  failure  to  meet, 

149. 
strikes  under  auspices  of,  see  Human 

element,  strikes, 
success  only  temporary,  153. 
unskilled  workers  opposed  by,  143, 

146,  148,  149,  154,  155,  266. 

See   also   Human   element,  shoe 
workers,  unskilled, 
vows  of,  147,  148,  266,  267. 
wages,  attitude  of,  towards,  146, 155. 
weakness  of  E.xecutive  Committee 

of,  152. 

labor,     see    Human    element,    shoe 

workers, 
labor  problems, 
rise  of,  125. 

before  organization  of  KSC,   141, 
142. 
labor-saving,  95. 
master  shoemakers, 

in  old  countries,  133,  260,  263. 
in  early  Massachusetts,  128,  142. 
negroes  as  apprentices,  32. 
order  of  St.  Crispin,  The,  a  European 
gild  of  the  1 6th  century,  145. 


INDEX 


279 


HUMAN  ELEMENT  (continued) 
Pious  Confraternity  of  Brother  Shoe- 
makers, The,  a  brotherhood  of 
the  mid-i7th  century,  262-264. 
regularity  of  work,  an  object  of  KSC, 
146. 

shoe  workers, 

Civil  War  brings  out  old,  117. 
Civil  War's  effect  on  status  of,  98, 

124. 
characterized,  127-131. 
Chinese  imported  for  use  as,  143, 

150,  154, 186. 
comparison  of   those   in  Ha   with 

mediaeval  shoemakers,  10. 
competition  among,  growth  of,  in 

Ha,  II. 
competition  for, 

in  D2,  44. 

in  D3,  144. 

reduced  with  advent  of  machinery 
in  F,  144. 
contact  of,  with  people  of  all  classes, 

130. 
contract    labor    of,    in    Batcheller 

factory,  255. 
domestic, 

in  D,  52,  53,  100,  198,  227-230. 

in  F,  109,  116,  124  n.  i. 
early  English  forerunners  of  those  of 

New  England,  128. 
economy  in  employment  of,  neces- 
sity for,  in  D3,  90,  95. 
exemption  of,  from  military  service 

during  Revolutionary  War,  192, 

193- 

Factory  Stage,  effect  of,  on  old, 
116. 

failure  of,  to  appreciate  entrepre- 
neurs'problems  in  Fi,  141, 142. 

farmers  as,  in  Ho,  6,  84. 

grouping  of,  best  in  larger  towns  in 
Ha,  12. 

ideals  of,  130. 

importance  of,  in  D3,  75. 

influence  of  old  customs  and  legends 
on, 128, 130. 


itinerant,  in  Ho,  5,  25,  134,  135, 
142. 

as  lawyers,  132. 

little  known  of,  127. 

machinery,  effect  of,  on,  98, 143-145. 

numbers  employed,  in  183^,  54  n.  2, 
207-210,  212;  in  1846,  69;  in 
i8j4,  220;  in  183$,  104;  in  1856, 
108;  in  i860,  112,  113;  increased 
greatly  in  F2,  125. 

opportunities  of,  for  thought  and 
study,  129,  130. 

as  politicians,  128,   129,   132,   133, 

257- 
as  preachers,  128,  129,  256,  258. 
as  readers,  129,  130,  132-134,  256. 
rise  of  many  to  role  of  entrepreneur, 

257- 

See    also    Stages    of    production 
(Di,  D2,  D3,  and  Fi),  entre- 
preneurs, 
scarcity  of,  during  Civil  War  gave 

impetus  to  use  of  machines,  124. 
as  scientists,  129. 

skill  of  high  order  required  in  fac- 
tories, 131  n.  I. 
skilled,  less  in  demand  in  D2,  52. 
study  of  individuals  as  types,  131- 

141. 
success  of,  in  other  fields,  marked, 

128, 129. 
superior  intelligence  of,  in  general, 

128, 129. 
supplyof,  inDi,32,  33. 
as  teachers,  138,  139,  173,  258. 
as  thieves  occasionally,  189,  190. 
troubles  of,  during  transition  from 

Ho  to  Ha,  8,  9. 
unemployment  of,  in  Fi,  106. 
unorganized  in  1875,  156. 
unskilled,  42,  52,  74,  i43-i4S- 
vacations   taken,   for  farming,   84; 

for  summer  recreation,  108. 
women    as,  see    Human    element, 

women, 
as  writers,  129,  130,  133,  256. 
See  also  other  sub-headings  under 

Human  element. 


28o 


INDEX 


HUMAN  ELEMENT  (continued) 
Society  of  Master  Cordwainers,  The, 
an    organization    never    existing 
in  Massachusetts,  142  n.  i. 
strikes,  146  n.  i,  147,  149-152. 
United  Beneficial  Society  of  Journey- 
men   Cordwainers,   an   organiza- 
tion never  existing  in  Massachu- 
setts, 142  n.  I. 
wages, 

in  Ho  and  Ha,  142,  173,  186,  187. 
inDi,  37,  198. 
in  D2,  43,  46,  144. 

methods  of  payment  of,  46,  48, 

52- 
in  D3,  69,  84-89,  217,  218. 

cash  payments  after  184J,  85. 

daily,  87,  88,  115. 

no  weekly  pay-roll,  85. 

for  piece-work,  86-89,  115,  227- 
230. 

for  women,  86,  229. 

survivals  of  truck  system  of  pay- 
ment, 84,  85. 
in  Fi,  140,  231-234,  237. 

advances  in,  meant  loss  to  entre- 
preneurs, 141. 

attitude   of  KSC   towards,    146, 

155- 
effect    of    introduction    of    ma- 
chinery on,  144,  145. 
inferior   workmen  could   reduce, 

144. 
of  old  retired  shoemakers  during 

Civil  War,  117. 
"subsistence  wages"   fought  by 

KSC,  146. 
trial  of  contract  system  in  con- 
nection with,  122. 
women  as  shoe  workers, 
in  Di,  25. 

in  D2,  47  n.  2,  52,  54  n.  2,  207,  212. 
in  D3,  69-71,  114,  140,  220,  227, 
229. 

irregular  employment  of,  100. 
wages  of,  86,  229. 
in  Fi,  98,  loi,  104,  113,  119,  124 
n.  I,  140. 


effects  of  Civil  War,  98,  117. 
in  a  modem  factory,  160,  162,  163. 
work,  amount  of,  available  in  D3,  87, 

229,  230. 
young  people  as  shoe  workers,   100 
n.  2,  121  n.  I,  135,  139,  143- 
See    also    Human    element,    child 
labor. 

Hyannis,  100  n.  i,  137. 


Industrial  life,  effect  of,  on  economic 

life,  16. 
Iron  industry,  connection  with  boot  and 

shoe    industry    at    Brockton,    vi 

n.  I. 


Johnson,  David  N.,  Sketches  of  Lynn, 

vn.  2,  73,  75,  120,  121  n.  i. 
Johnson,     Edward,     Wonder     Working 

Providence  of  Sion's  Savior,  9,  170, 

171,  183. 
Jones,  Asa,  pioneer  domestic  worker  of 

Nantucket,  icon,  i,  137,  138. 
Joppa,  see  Bridgewater.    (Joppa  was  a 

part  of  East  Bridgewater  which  is 

now  called  Elmwood.) 
Journeymen,  see  Human  element. 


Kertland,  Philip,  English  shoemaker 
who  came  to  Lynn  in  1625,  23, 

131- 
Kimball    and    Robinson's    factory    at 

Brookfield,  114-116,  231-235,  266 

n.  I. 
Kingman,   Bradford,   History   of  North 

Bridgewater,  18  n.  2,  180  n.  i. 
Knights  of  St.  Crispin,  The,  see  Human 

element,  KSC. 


Labor  ,  see  Human  element ,  shoe  workers. 
Larcom,  Lucy,   poem   of,  about  shoe- 
binders,  V  n.  2,  131  n.  I. 
Lawrence,  190  n.  i. 


INDEX 


281 


Leach   family    of    S.    Bridgewater,    E. 
Middleboro,  Raynham,andBrock- 
ton,  shoemakers  of  Ha,  D  and  F, 
115,  138,139- 
See  also  Eddy  and  Leach. 
Leather,  see  Stages  of  Production  (Ho, 
Ha,  Di,  D2,  D3,  Fi,  F2),  leather. 
Lescohier,  Don  D.,  The  Knights  of  St. 
Crispin,  1867-1874,  145  n.  3,  147 
n.  2,  148  n.  I,  150. 
Lewis  and  Newhall,  History  of  Lynn,  183 

n.  I. 
Lincoln,  Ephraim,  one  of  the  first  entre- 
preneurs of  D2,  not  a  shoemaker, 
48,  49. 
Littlefield  family  of  Avon,  typical  entre- 
preneurs of  D2,  50-53,  62. 
Lynn  (formerly  Saugus),  a  preeminent 
shoe  town, 
early  conditions  in,  9,  11,  12,  22,  23, 

131, 142 n.  I,  182,  183. 
in  Di,  22,  28-31,  34,  39,  40,  188,  19s, 

197. 
inD2,  50,  59,  63,  210,  212. 
in  D3, 72, 73, 75, 77-81,  83,  84, 91, 144 

n.  2. 
in  F,  98,  loi,  105,  106,  109,  112,  114, 
119-121,  144  n.  I,  147,  150. 


Machinery,  Human  element,  shoe  work- 
ers, machinery;  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion (D3,  Fi,  F2),  machines. 

Maguire,  see  Burrell  and  Maguire. 

Maine  in  F2,  144  n.  i. 

Markets,  see  Stages  of  Production  (Ho, 
Ha,  D,  Di,  D3),  market. 

Massachusetts  Bay,  Records  of  Colony  of, 

171-173- 
McKay,    Col.    Gordon,   capitalist   who 

purchased  from  Lyman  R.  Blake 

the  McKay  machine,  v  n.  2,  in, 

121,  245,  246. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production  (Fi  and 

F2),  McKay  machine. 
Middleboro,  a  shoe  town  of  D,  52,  71,  72, 

134,  135,  138,  139,  209. 
Middlesex,  34. 


Middlesex  county,  a  centre  for  boot  and 
shoe  industry,  81,  208,  211. 

Milford,  72,  209. 

Milwaukee,  origin  of  KSC  in,  145. 

Mitchell  and  Bryant,  first  wholesale  boot 
and  shoe  house  in  Boston,  59-63, 
203. 


Nantucket,  shoe-manufacturing  in,  in 
Ha  and  D,  100  n.  i,  137,  138,  179 
n.  I. 
Natick,  a  shoe  town, 
in  Ha,  54. 

in  L),  53,  54,  68-72,  80,  208,  220. 
New  Bedford,  81. 
New  England, 
boot  and  shoe  manufacture  in,  in  i860, 

113- 
contemporary  account  of  trades  in,  in 

1650,  170,  171. 
New  London  (Conn.),  189. 
New  York  City, 
in  D,  72  n.  2,  136,  192. 
in  F,  104  n.  4,  107,  108  n.  3,  112,  118 

n.  I,  119, 125. 
Newark  (N.  J.),  119. 
Newburyport,  105,  210,  212. 
Newhall  family  of  Lynn,  entrepreneurs 

ofD,  50,  99,  193-196. 
Newspaper   articles   or   advertisements 

quoted  or  referred  to,  29, 168, 169, 

188-192,  245  n.  I. 
Nichols,  John  Brooks,  adapter  of  Howe 

sewing  machine  to  boot  and  shoe 

industry,  94. 
Norfolk  county,  a  centre  for  boot  and 

shoe  industry,   67,   81,  99,   208, 

211,  212. 
North  Adams,  a  shoe  town  in  F,  143, 150. 
North  Bridgewater,  see  Brockton  (pres- 
ent name  of  town). 
North  Brookfield,  see  Brookfield. 


Parts  to  a  shoe,  3. 
Peabody,  190  n.  i. 
Pennsylvania  in  F,  118,  154. 


282 


INDEX 


Philadelphia, 
in  Ha,  lo,  igo. 
in  D,  28,  29  n.  3,  32,  Z2>,  72  n.  2,  86, 

142  n.  I. 
in  F,  112,  118,  119,  144. 
Plymouth  county,  a  centre  for  boot  and 

shoe  industry,  67,  99,  113,  209, 

211,  212. 
Political  history  of  four  Massachusetts 

shoe  centres,  early,  176-183. 
Portland  (Me.),  3Z- 
Portsmouth  (N.  H.),  30,  188,  193,  195, 

197,  199. 
Pratt,    J.    Winsor,    leather   shoe-string 

manufacturer  of   Randolph,   90, 

91. 
Prouty,  Isaac,  the  rich  cobbler-farmer  of 

Spencer,  136,  137. 
Putting-out  System,  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, Domestic  stage. 

QuABAUG,  see  Brookfield  (present  name 
of  town). 

Randolph  (formerly  W.  Randolph,  and 
part  of  Braintree),  a  shoe  town, 
early  conditions  in,  11,  17-19,  176- 

180. 
in  D,  19,  45,  50,  52,  72,  73,  81-92, 135, 

136,  180,  208,  217  n.  I. 
in  F,  98-101,  103-109,  no  n.  i,  n.  2, 

114,  IIS,  117,  153,  262. 
See  also  Braintree;  S.  Randolph. 
Raynham,  a  shoe  town, 
in  D,  87,  92  n.  i. 
in  F,  102,  110-112,  114,  115,  139. 
Reading,  72,  208,  211. 
Reed,  George,  of  Dighton,  farmer  in  Ho, 
excerpts  from  papers  of,  173-176. 
Reed,  Harvey  and  Quincy,  of  Weymouth 
and  Boston,  typical  entrepreneurs 
of  late  Ha  and  early  D,  13-15, 49, 
so- 
Religious  history  of  four  Massachusetts 

shoe  centres,  early,  176-183. 
Rhode  Island,  boot  and  shoe  industry 
rarely  developed  beyond  Ha  in. 


Roads,  lack  of,  in  early  days,  177,  178. 

Roberts,  James  A.,  New  York  in  the 
Revolution  as  Colony  and  State, 
192,  193. 

Robinson  and  Co.  of  Lynn,  typical  en- 
trepreneurs of  late  D,  79,  80,  219. 

Rockland,  61. 

Sachs,  Hans,  German  poet-traveller- 
shoemaker,  130, 133. 

St.  Crispin,  patron  saint  of  shoemakers, 
130,  145,  170,  258-262,  264-266. 

St.  Crispin's  Day,  130. 

St.  Hugh,  patron  saint  of  shoemakers, 
130,  169,  264,  265. 

Salem,  as  shipping-point  in  D,  34,  196. 

Sampson,  Calvin  T.,  of  North  Adams, 
entrepreneur  of  F  who  first  made 
use  of  Chinese  labor,  143,  150. 

San  Francisco,  103,  107. 

Saugus,  see  Lynn  (present  name  of  town). 

Scope  of  present  volume,  vii. 

Sewing  machines,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion (D3  and  Fi ),  sewing  machines. 

Sherman,  Roger,  shoemaker  whose  trade 
knov/ledge  helped  the  Continental 
budget  in  the  Revolutionary  War, 

132,  133- 
Shakespeare,  William,  King  Henry   V, 

265,  266. 
Shoe-blacking, early  advertisement  of,  30. 
Shoe  workers,  see  Human  element,  shoe 

workers. 
Shooe-maker's  Glory,  The,  an  old  song, 

264,  265. 
Shops,  see  Stages  of  Production  (Ha,  Di, 

D2,  D3,  Fi),  shops. 
Skinner  and  Ward,  general  storekeepers 

in  Brookfield  in  early  D,  55-57. 
Songs  of  shoemaking,  130,  145,  264,  265. 
Sources, 
description  of,  vi. 
difficulties  of  collection  of,  v. 
for  Ho,  4,  5  n.  2,  173-176. 
for  Ha,  173,  184,  185,  188-190. 
for  D,  29,  36,  37,  184,  185,  188-192, 

194. 
for  Human  element,  127,  128. 


INDEX 


283 


South  Abington,  245. 

South  Africa,  leather  imported  from,  in 

D,  so- 
South  America,  sale  of  Massachusetts 

made  shoes  in,  in  D2,  62,  63. 
South  Bridgewater,  138. 

See  also  Bridgewater;  Brockton  (North 
Bridgewater). 
South  Randolph,  46. 

See  also  Braintree;  Randolph. 
South  Weymouth,  62. 
See  also  Weymouth. 
Southworth,  Jedediah,  of  W.  Stoughton, 
farmer-shoemaker  of  Ha,  excerpts 
from  papers  of,  183-185. 
Spencer,  a  shoe  town,  72,  136,  137,  210. 

STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  in  boot 

and  shoe  industry,  vii. 
Biicher's  views  confirmed,  vii. 
Home  stage,  3-8,  15-23. 
account  books  show  conditions  in, 

173-176. 
approximate  extent  of,  15. 
capital,  lack  of,  in,  25. 
care  taken  of  shoes  in,  178  n.  i. 
characterized,  8. 

economic  conditions  during,  15-23. 
lasts  in,  5. 
leather, 

kinds  in  use  in,  5-7. 

preparation  of,  in,  4,  6. 

tanning  of,  in,  6,  7,  18,  182. 
market,  lack  of,  in,  8. 
Phase  I  (purely  home-made  boots), 

5.6. 
Phase  2  (itinerant  cobblers'  work), 

5-7. 

See  also   Human  element,   shoe 
workers,  itinerant. 
place  of,  in  evolution  of  industry, 

vii. 
processes  of  shoemaking  in,  3,  4. 
rarity  of  indulgence  in  outside  work 

by  farmers  in,  179. 
summary  of,  7,  8. 
tanning,  see  Stages  of  Production, 

Ho,  leather,  tanning  of. 


tools  required  in,  3-5. 

transition  to  Ha,  8,  9,  18,  20,  22,  32 

n.  I. 
typical  of  frontier  life,  15,  16. 

Handicraft  stage,  3,4,  8-23. 

account  books  show  conditions  in, 

173,  184, 185. 
approximate  extent  of,  15. 
bespoke  work  in,  8-1 1,  19,  25,  128. 
capital,  late  rise  of,  in,  25. 
characterized,  8,  24. 
competition,  spur  of  European,  in, 

10. 
custom  work  in,  134,  138. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production,  Ha, 
extra  sale  work, 
customers  required  to  go  to  shoe- 
makers'   shops   by   Massachu- 
setts Court  in  1644,  134. 
division  of  labor,  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, Ha,  specialization, 
early  appearance  and  disappearance 
of,  in  thickly  settled  communi- 
ties, 9. 
economic  conditions  during,  15-23. 
extra  sale  work  in,  11-15,  188,  189, 
191. 
closely  connected  with  D,  24. 
first  appearance  of,  12. 
growth  of  practice  of,  12,  13. 
influence  of  old  English  customs 

on,  128. 
late  development  of,  in  Brockton, 

20;  in  Middleboro,  134. 
methods  of  sale  of,  12. 
profits  of,  13. 
standards  of  work  low  for  earliest, 

13- 

transition  to,  11,  25. 
"fair  price"  in,  9. 
height  of ,  9. 
leather, 

importing  of,  in,  7. 

plentiful,  in,  171. 

prices  of,  in,  173,  186. 

provided  by  customers  occasion- 
ally in,  172. 


284 


INDEX 


STAGES   OF    PRODUCTION  {cont.) 
Handicraft  stage  {continued) 
tanning  of,  in,  7,  18,  20. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production,  Ha, 
stock, 
legislative  restrictions  in,  9. 
markets, 

development  of,  in,  8. 

directly  dealt  with  by  shoemaker 

in,  24. 
uncertain  in,  12. 
materials,  see  Stages  of  Production, 

Ha,  stock, 
newspaper  advertisements  for  the 

shoe  industry  in,  188-190. 
Phase    I     (bespoke    work  —  which 

see),  8-1 1. 
Phase  2  (extra  sale  work  —  which 

see),  11-15. 
place  in  evolution  of  industry,  vii. 
prices  of  shoes  in,  173,  185,  187. 
kept    high    by    organized    shoe 
workers,  171. 
repairing,  charges  for,  in,  185. 
shops,  small,  134,  138. 

customers  required  to  go  to,  in 
1644  by  Massachusetts  Court, 

134- 
organization  of,  in,  10. 
specialization,  lack  of,  in,  ii. 
standards  of  work  in,  8,  10,  11,  13. 
stock,  prices  of,  in,  186,  187. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production,  Ha, 
leather, 
tanning,  see  Stages  of  Production, 

Ha,  leather,  tanning  of. 
ten-footers,  see  Stages  of  Production, 

Ha,  shops,  small, 
tools  in. 
compared  with  mediaeval  tools,  10. 
prices  of,  186,  187. 
transition  from  Ho,  8,  9,  18,  20,  22. 
transition  to  Di,  14,  19,  20,  22,  24, 
40,54,57,58. 

Domestic  stage,  24-95. 

appearance  of,  in  England,  26,  27. 
characterized,  24. 


market, 

indirectly  dealt  with  by  shoe- 
maker in,  24. 

national,  as  a  cause  of  its  appear- 
ance, 27. 

Phase  I,  24-41. 

account  books  show  conditions  in, 
37,  184,  185,  194. 

barter  conditions  in,  31,  32. 

booksellers  as  shoe  retailers  and 
entrepreneurs  in,  ^^. 

capital, 
attracted  by  widening  and  as- 
surance of  market  in,  41. 
rise  of,  in,  25-28. 

capitalist,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, Di,  entrepreneurs. 

characterized,  25. 

children's  shoes,  Lynn's  specialty 
in,  39,  40. 

containers    used    for    exporting 
shoes  in,  30. 

correspondence  of  shoe  merchants 
shows  conditions  in,  36. 

credits  long  in  Southern  sales  in, 
141. 

early  opposition  to,  in  England,  27. 

entrepreneurs, 

appear  for  first  time,  24. 

not  necessarily  shoemakers,  25, 

33,  37- 
reasons  for  non-shoemakers  be- 
coming, 37. 

export  trade,  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, Di,  West  Indies. 

extent  of,  24,  25. 

financial  conditions  in,  31,  32. 

importation  of  foreign-made  shoes 
in,  28-30,  188. 

introduction  of,  into  Nantucket, 

137- 
inventory  of  typical  retail  store 

in,  197. 
leather, 
advertisements  for,  in,  31-34. 
dealings  in,  in,  194,  195. 
importation  of,  in ,  30. 


INDEX 


285 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  (cont.) 
Domestic  stage  {continued) 
Phase  I  —  leather  {continued) 
largely  domestic,  in,  31. 
prices  of,  in,  197. 
tanning  of,  in,  190-192. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
Di,  stock, 
letters  from  domestic  workers  in, 

198. 
market, 

capital  attracted  as  it  is  widened 

and  assured,  41. 
widening  of,  in,  28. 
materials,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, Di,  stock, 
men's     shoes     manufactured     in 
southern  and  western  Mas- 
sachusetts in,  40. 
middlemen-retailers  in,  197-200. 
newspaper  advertisements  for  the 
shoe  industry  in,  29,  188-190. 
opposition  to,  in  America,  lack  of 

early,  27. 
prices  of  shoes  in,  ^^,  38,  185,  194, 

197-200. 
profits  in,  199. 
public  vendues  in,  30,  189. 
repairing,  charges  for,  in,  185,  199. 
retail  trade  in,  ;i;i,  193-197. 
Revolutionary  War, 
exemption  of  shoemakers  from 
military  service  during,  192, 

193- 
as  stimulus  to  the  industry,  29, 
39-41,  132. 
shops,  small, 

overhead  charges  slight  in,  141. 
sale  of,  in,  191. 
Southern  sales  in,  20  n.  2,  34-36, 

141,  196. 
standards,    influence   of   foreign, 

28,  29. 
stock, 

imported  for  use  in,  28-30. 
prices  of,  in,  39. 
supphed    by  entrepreneur   in, 
24. 


See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
Di,  leather, 
summary,  40,  41. 
tanneries,    newspaper    advertise- 
ments   regarding,    in,    190- 
192. 
tanning,  see  Stages  of  Production, 

Di,  leather,  tarming  of. 
tardy  development  of,  in  central, 
northern  and  western  Massa- 
chusetts, 31,  34. 
tariff, 

feared  by  British  consul  in,  37. 
legislation  of  i^Sg  a  stimulus, 

39-41- 

ten-footers,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, Di,  shops,  small. 

tools, 

imported  for  use  in,  28,  30,  189. 
prices  of,  as  shown  by  account 

books,  39. 
supplied  by  entrepreneur  in,  24. 

transition  from  Ha,  14,  19,  20,  22, 
24,  27,  40,  54,  57,  58. 

transition  to  D2,  44,  45,  58. 

West  Indies,  sales  in,  14,  29  n.  3, 
34-36,  144- 

wholesale  trade  in,  s^. 

women's  shoes,  Lynn's  specialty 
in,  39,  40. 

Phase  2,  42-64. 

account  books  show  conditions  in, 

44-48,  55,  201-207. 
banking  interests  of  shoe  entre- 
preneurs in,  50. 
barter  conditions  in,  51,  56. 

in  export  trade,  62. 
Boston  and  Worcester  Railroad, 
effect  of  construction  of,  53. 
capital, 

investments  of,  increased  in,  42. 
slow  growth  of,  in,  201. 
capitalists,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, D2,  entrepreneurs, 
central  shop,  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, D2,  shops,  central, 
characterized,  42. 


286 


INDEX 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  {cont.) 
Domestic  stage  {continued) 
Phase  2  {continued) 
check  to  industry  due  to  Panic 

of  J837,  64. 
competing  industries  in,  210-212. 
competition  in  industry,  growth 

of,  in,  42. 
competition  of  buyers  leads  to 
lowering  of  standards  in,  74. 
containers  for  shipping  shoes  in, 

51,57,  61,62. 
credits  long  in  Western  and  South- 
ern sales  in,  141. 
custom  work  in,  47,  49,  57. 
cutting  in  central  shops  in,  44,  49. 
division   of  labor,  see  Stages  of 
Production,    D2,    specializa- 
tion, 
entrepreneurs, 

assist  retail  firms  to  get  estab- 
lished in,  59. 
Batchellers  typical  in,  55-59- 
central  shop  developed  by,  in, 

43,48,  49,  lion.  3. 
earliest  in  Randolph  in,  45, 46. 
as  general  store-keepers  in,  45, 

46,  48,  49,  55-57,  202  n.  2. 
Littlefield  Brothers  typical  in, 

51-53- 

inNatickin,  53,  54. 

not  necessarily  shoemakers  in, 
49,  74,  lion.  3. 

other  interests  and  ventures  of, 
in,  49-51,  57,  63. 
export  trade,  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, D2,  South  America; 
West  Indies, 
extra   sale   work  in,  47,  49,  56, 

57- 
foreign  trade  methods  in,  62. 
general  economic  conditions  dur- 
ing, 54-57- 
inspection, 

difficult  before  appearance  of 

central  shop  in,  43. 
not  properly   made   by   entre- 
preneurs not  shoemakers,  74. 


jobbing  in,  58,  59,  6r. 
land  interests  of  shoe  entrepre- 
neurs in,  50. 
leather, 

"cabbage"  stock  in,  43. 
prices  of,  in,  202. 
tanning  of,  in,  200,  211,  212. 
usually    furnished    by    entre- 
preneur in,  43,  47. 
waste  of,  in,  prior  to  appear- 
ance of  central  shop,  43. 
output, 

of  central  shops  in,  46. 

of    Massachusetts     towns    in 

1837,  207-210,  212. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
D2,  trade,  volume  of. 
Panic  of  1837, 

hard  on  children,  136. 
marks  close  of  phase,  42,  50, 
54,  58,  63,  64. 
phraseology,  changes  in,  in,  44. 
poor  work,  causes  of,  in,  74. 
prosperity  just  prior  to  1837,  63, 

73- 
quantity    more    important    than 

quality  in,  42. 
rapid  work  necessary  in,  42. 
repairing  in,  47,  49. 
retail    firms    assisted    by    entre- 
preneurs in,  59. 
shops, 
central, 
developments  of,  in,  43,  44, 
48,49,52,57,  lion.  3,139, 
201. 
function  of,  in,  44. 
needed   in   connection   with 

inspection  in,  43. 
overhead  charges  slight  in, 
141. 
small, 
develop   into   central   shops 

in,  139,  201. 
described,  43  n.  i. 
overhead  charges  slight  in, 

141. 
waste  in,  in,  43,  44. 


INDEX 


287 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  (cont.) 
Domestic  stage  (continued) 
Phase  2  (continued) 
South    American    sales   in,    62, 

63. 
Southern  sales  in,  42,  49  n.  2,  50, 

51,  59-61,  141,  200,  201,  203, 

204. 
specialization  in  processes  in,  42- 

44. 
standards  lowered  in,  42. 
supplies  sold  to  shoemakers  by 

entrepreneurs  in,  49. 
tanning,  see  Stagefe  of  Production, 

D2,  leather,  tanning  of. 
tariff  protection  in,  63. 
ten-footers,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, D2,  shops,  small, 
trade, 
extent  of,  in,  202-204. 
volume  of,  in,  44,  50,  54  n.  2,  56, 

58,  204-207. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 

D2,  output, 
transition  from  Di,  44,  45,  58. 
transition  to  D3,  64. 
transportation    facilities    in,    50 

n.  I,  53,  61. 
West  Indies  sales  in,  42,  50,  51, 

59,61,  62. 
Western  sales  in,  57-59, 141. 
women's  shoes  in,  211. 

Phase  3,  65-96. 

account   books   show   conditions 
in,  79,  80,  213-218,  221-230. 
allied  industries  in,  89-91,  220. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
D3,  containers;  counters;  cut 
leather;  shoe  strings;  soles. 
Australian  sales  in,  81,  83. 
banking  facilities  in, 
importance  of ,  67. 
increased  demand  for,  68. 
payment  of  cash  wages  made 

possible  by,  85. 
use  of,  shown  by  account  books, 
219. 


boots,  high-legged,  specialized  in, 
by  certain  localities  in,  72, 
73,81-84,  114,  115. 
boss  contractors  in  ten-footers  in, 

86. 
Boston  and  Worcester  Railroad 

in,  216. 
brogans  specialized  in  by  certain 
localities  in,  80,  81,  114,  139. 
"  Calif ornians,"  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, D3,  boots, 
capital  in, 
attraction  of,  68. 
regaining  of,  following  panic  of 

1837,  66. 
small  amount  only  needed  to 
equip  a  central  shop,  79. 
capitalists,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, D3,  entrepreneurs, 
central < shops,  5ee  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, D3,  shops,  central, 
competition    between    manufac- 
turers in, 
economies  of  stock  and  labor 

the  result  of,  90. 
expert  supervision  of  product 

the  result  of,  71,  72,  94. 
improvement  in  stock  and  proc- 
esses the  result  of ,  74,  75,  78. 
specialization  the  result  of,  81, 

94,  95- 
containers  for  shipping  shoes  in, 

70,  80,  216. 
manufacture  of,  as  a  separate 

industry,  77,  78. 
counters,  cutting  of,  as  a  separate 

industry,  90. 
credits  long  in  Western  and  South- 
ern sales  in,  141. 
"crooked  shoes,"  first  appearance 

of,  in,  76. 
custom  as  determining  location  of 

boot   and  shoe  industry  in, 

67. 
customers,  different  classes  of,  as 

cause  of  specialization  in,  82, 

83,  95- 
cut  leather  industry,  77. 


288 


INDEX 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  {cont.) 
Domestic  stage  {continued) 
Phase  3  {continued) 
distribution  of  work  to  domestic 

workers  in,  loo. 
division  of  labor,   see  Stages   of 
Production,    D3,    specializa- 
tion, 
economies  of  boot  and  shoe  manu- 
facture, 89-92. 
entrepreneurs  in, 
advantageous  position  of  those 

surviving  panic  of  18 jy,  65. 
boot    and    shoe  industry   now 

their  main  interest,  68. 
new  type  of,  66,  68. 
partnership  between  shoemaker 
and  capitalist  common,   71, 

139- 

factory,  genesis  of,  86. 

"freighters,"  agents  who  distrib- 
uted to  domestic  workers,  70. 

"gang,"  a  factor  in  shoemaking, 
86. 

grading,  increased  stress  on,  in, 

75,  83- 
heels,  use  of,  in,  93. 
imitation  as  determining  location 
of  boot  and  shoe  industry,  67. 
jobbers  in,  83. 
lasts  in,  91,  93,  217,  218. 
leather  in, 

prices  of,   115   n.  3,    214,   226, 

227. 
sale   of   scrap,  for   shoe   string 
manufacture,  90,  91. 
localities,  specialization  of  indus- 
try in  certain,  66-68. 
machines  in, 
development  of,  78,  80,  92,  95, 

96,  139. 
few  considered  necessary,  79. 
relation  of,  to  economizing  of 

time  and  labor,  92,  95,  96. 
review  of  use  of,  93-96. 
valuation  of,  in  typical  shop, 

219. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 


D3,  sewing  machine;     sole- 
cutter;  stripper, 
manufactory,  94  n.  3. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
D3,  shops,  central, 
markets,  new,  growth  of,  in,  66, 

81,  82,  94,  95. 
materials,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, D3,  stock, 
models,  new,  appearance  of,  in, 

75,  82,  83,  94,  95. 
output,  69,  82. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
D3,  trade,  volume  of. 
panic  of  i8jy,  revival  of  industry 

after,  65,  66. 
patterns   for   cutting   leather   in, 

75,  76,  93- 
payment  by  jobbers,  method  of, 

in,  69. 
piece-work    in    homes    and    ten- 
footers  in,  85,  86. 
prices  of  shoes  in,  81,  84,  213-216, 

221-225. 
ready-made     shoes,     growth     of 

vogue  of,  in,  8x,  82,  95. 
sewing  machine  in,  78,  93-96. 
shoe  strings,  leather,  cutting  of,  in, 
as  a  separate  industry,  90,  91. 
as  a  side  line,  224,  225. 
shops  in, 
central, 

how  used,  71,  72,  94. 
increasing  importance  of,  80, 

81. 
overhead   charges   slight   in, 

141. 
processes  taking  place  in,  85, 

88. 
small     amount     of     capital 
needed  to  equip,  79. 
small,  71,  100,  218. 
overhead   charges   slight   in, 

141. 
processes    taking    place    in, 

8s,  86,  88,  89. 
rented  to  shoemakers,  86. 
valuation  of  typical,  214. 


INDEX 


289 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  {cont.) 
Domestic  stage  {continued) 
Phase  3  {continued) 

sizes  begin  to  be  carefully  noted, 

228. 
sole-cutter,  76,  77. 
soles,  cutting  of,  as  a  separate  in- 
dustry, 90. 
Southern  sales  in,  70,  72  n.  3,  75, 
81,  82  n.  2,  95,  no  n.  3,  139, 
141. 
specialization  in, 
geographical,  66-68. 
in  processes, 

competition  as  cause  of,  81, 

94,  95- 
differences  in  classes  of  cus- 
tomers as  cause  of,  82,  83, 

95- 
growth  of,  72,  73,  80,  81,  94. 
shown  by  list  of  occupations, 

91. 
in  ten-footers,  86. 
standardization  in, 
need  of,  73,  74. 
growth  of,  72-78,  92,  95,  i44- 
statistics  of  manufacture  in,  73, 

82. 
stock  in, 

economy  in  use  of,  necessary,  90. 
greater  cost  of  higher  grades,  84. 
importance  of,  75. 
inventory  of,  in  typical   shop, 

219. 
purchases  of,  225-227. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
D3,  leather, 
stripper,    a    leather-cutting    ma- 
chine in,  76,  77. 
styles,  more  follow  the  panic  of 

1837,  144. 
summary  of,  94-96. 
super \'ision    of    labor,    rise    and 
growing  importance  of,  in,  71, 
72,92,  94. 
tanneries,  importance  of  nearness 

to,  in,  67. 
tariff  in,  79. 


technical  progress  in,  83. 

ten-footer,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, D3,  shops,  small. 

time  allowed  to  domestic  workers 
unlimited,  100. 

time-saving,  tin  sole-patterns  and, 
76. 

tools  in, 

century-old    models    still    ex- 
clusively used,  93. 
importance  of,  75. 
prices  of,  227. 

toolmaking  in  connection  with 
boot  and  shoe  industry  in,  67. 

trade,  volume  of,  69,  84,  92. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
D3,  output. 

transition  from  D2,  64. 

transition  to  Fi,  96,  114-116. 

transportation  facilities,  import- 
ance of,  in,  67,  70,  71  n.  I,  83, 
84. 

West,  expansion  of,  effect  on  boot 
and  shoe  industry  in,  82,  83, 

95- 
West  Indies  sales  in,  75,  no  n.  3, 

144. 
Western  sales  in,  72  n.  3,  81,  83, 

95,  141- 
women's  shoes  specialized  in  by 

certain  locaUties,  72,  73,  78, 

81. 
work,   irregular  amounts   of,   in, 

229,  230. 
working  days  per  year  in,  87. 
workmanship,  more  precision  in, 

following  panic  of  1837,  144. 

place  in  evolution  of  industry,  vii. 
tardy  development  of,  vi  n.  i. 

Factory  stage, 
early  opposition  to,  in  England,  27. 

Phase  I,  97-126. 

account  books  show  conditions  in, 

116,  230-244,  246-255. 
allied  industries  in,  123. 


290 


INDEX 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  {cont.) 
Factory  stage  {continued) 
Phase  I  {continued) 
army  shoes  for  Civil  War  in,  117, 

118,  124,  245,  246. 
Australian  sales  in,  98-101,  103, 

107,  no  n.  I,  267. 
banking   facilities   in,    102,    106, 

230,  231. 
Boston  and  Albany  Railroad  in, 

123- 

businesses  shut  down  or   move 
because  of  KSC  activities  in, 

150,  153,  154. 
capital  in, 

circulating,   less   important   in 

this  period,  121,  141. 
fixed ,  dangerously  large  amounts 
necessary,  103,  no,  121,  141. 
more  required,  124. 
total  investment   of,  in   i860, 

112,  113. 
use   of,  for   factory   buildings, 
no. 
capitalists,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, Fi,  entrepreneurs, 
central  shop,  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, Fi,  shops,  central, 
characterized,  97,  98,  123,  124. 
Chicago  strike  of  KSC  in,  151, 

152. 
Civil  War  during, 
effect  of,  on  shoe  industry,  98, 

109-118,  124. 
use   of   McKay   machines   in, 
245,  246. 
competition    between    manufac- 
turers, 
increasing  importance  of,  122. 
leads    to    emphasis    on    good 
workmanship  and  speed,  109. 
Congress  shoe  in,  loi,  in. 
containers  for  shipping  shoes  in, 

252,  255. 
contract  system  of  wages,  trial  of, 

in  Brookfield  in,  122. 
cooperative    manufacture    advo- 
cated by  KSC  in,  146,  147. 


delay  in  appearance  of,  in  Brook- 
field,  114-116. 
depression  due  to  panic  of  1857, 

103-109. 
distribution  of  business  in,  238- 

244. 
economies,  necessity  for,  a  cause 

of  F,  98. 
entrepreneurs  in, 

influenced   by   outside   invest- 
ments, 262. 
more  and  more  from  outside 
trade,  141. 
European  trade  in,  104  n.  4. 
factories  in,  119-121,  140. 
appearance  of,  not  cause  of  F, 

98,  124. 
buildings,  development  of,  iio- 
112,  139;     involve  large  in- 
vestments, 141. 
increase  of  work  in,  100,  loi. 
output  in,  size  of,  no  n.  i. 
rise  of,  97-101,  123,  124. 
size  of,  indicated  by  accounts, 
246-255. 
failures  in,  105,  108,  109,  125. 
fixed  improvements  in,  103. 
full  development  of  stage  in  Lynn 

by  1865,  120. 
"good   low-priced   shoe"    devel- 
oped in  Brockton  in,  118, 119. 
large   scale   production,   adapta- 
tion to  needs  of,  100,  loi. 
lasts  in,  233,  234,  255. 
leather  in, 

hemlock  tanned,  118. 
oak  tanned, 118. 
prices  of,  104-107,  118,  234. 
"Union,"  n8. 
machines  in,  140,  251. 

"abuse"  of,  attacked  by  KSC, 

146. 
importance   of,    in    connection 

with  investment,  141. 
installation  of,  not  cause  of  F, 

98. 
make   use   of   unskilled   labor 
especially  feasible,  143. 


INDEX 


291 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  {cont.) 
Factory  stage  {continued) 

Phase  I  —  machines  in  {continued) 
use  of,  made  necessary  by  com- 
petition, 109,  no. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
Fi,  McKay  machine;  sewing 
machine;    Wheeler  and  Wil- 
cox machine, 
materials,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, Fi,  stock. 
McKay  machine  in,  96,  98,  loi, 
no.  III,  117-119,  121,  124, 
143,  156,  254,  255. 
history  of   invention    of,   245, 

246. 
royalty  system  on,  121,  122. 
McKay  sewed  shoe  not  superior 

to  custom  shoe  in,  143  n.  i. 
manufactory,  see  Stages  of  Pro- 
duction, Fi,  factories, 
orders,  increase  in  size  of,  in,  99. 
output  in,  no  n.  i,  119  n.  2. 
in  i860,  112,  113. 
uniformity    of,   a   desideratum 

leading  to  F,  98. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
Fi,  trade,  volume  of. 
outside  investments,  influence  of, 

on  entrepreneurs  in,  262. 
"overproduction"   in,    103,    105, 

106. 
panic  of  18 jy, 

general  effect  on  boot  and  shoe 

trade  of,  103-109. 
recuperation     following,     log- 
in, 
panic  of  1873,  125. 

effect  of,  on  KSC,  156. 
power  in, 

introduction  of,  124. 
use  of,  not  cause  of  F,  98,  119, 
120. 
prices  of  shoes  in,  232,  233,  235. 
problems   that   came   with,    141, 

142. 
processes  in  manufacture  in  Lynn 
in  1880,  120, 121. 


profits,  growth  of,  in,  99. 
prosperity  in,  103. 
putting-out  in,  236-239. 
recuperation   following   panic   of 

1857,  109-in. 
sewing-machines  in,  100,  loi,  109, 

120  n.  I. 
shops  in, 

central,  number  of,  in  i860, 112, 

113- 
small,  decrease  in  use  of,  109, 

120. 
use  of  term  for  "factory,"  loi, 

106  n.  4. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 

Fi,  factories. 
Southern  sales  in,  40,  98,  104  n.  4, 

106,  107,  109,  112,  114,  238, 

239- 
specialization  in, 
geographical,  124. 
in  processes,  increase  of,   124; 
in  Lynn  in  1880,  120,   121; 
renewed  following  panic  of 
1873, 156. 
speculation  in,  103,  107,  125. 
speed  in  production  in, 

adaptation  to  needs  of,  100,  loi. 
emphasis  on,  109,  no. 
stock  in, 

cutting  up  of ,  103,  105. 

development  of,  123. 

large  supplies  of,  used,  124, 141. 

purchases  of,  254,  255. 

total  value  used  in  i860,  112, 

"3- 

See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
Fi,  leather. 

styles  of  shoes,  great  variety  of, 
106,  125,  144. 

summary  of,  123-126. 

supervision  at  the  central  shop, 
chief  characteristic  of,  97,  98, 
123,  124. 
needed  to  secure  better  work 
and  to  save  waste,  109. 

ten-footer,  see  Stages  of  Produc- 
tion, Fi,  shops,  small. 


292 


INDEX 


STAGES  OF  PRODUCTION  {cont.) 
Factory  stage  {continued) 
Phase  I  {continued) 

transition  from  D3,  96,  114-116. 
transition  to  F2,  124,  125,  156. 
transportation  in, 

account  books  show  costs  of, 

123,  249,  250,  253-255. 
improvement    of    facilities    of, 

101-103,  116. 
methods  of,  238-246. 
trade,  volume  of,  in,  104,  107,  108, 
122,  123,  238-244,  246. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
Fi,  output. 
West  Indies  sales  in,  in. 
Western   sales   in,    98-101,    103, 
106,  107,  109,  112,  114,  240- 
244. 
Wheeler  and  Wilcox  machines  in, 

140. 
workmanship  in, 
emphasis  on  quality  of,  109. 
more    precision    in,    following 
panic  of  1857,  144. 

Phase  2, 
capital,  development  of,  in,  156. 
characterized,  125,  156. 
factory,  modern,  organization  of, 

described,  159-167. 
Goodyear  welting  machine  in,  96, 

124,  125,  160,  165,  167. 
Goodyear  welt  shoes  character- 
istic of,  156. 

leather,  use  of,  in  modern  shoe- 
making  in,  159-163,  165,  166. 

machines,  great  use  of,  in  modern 
factories  in,  159-167. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
F2,  Goodyear  welt  machine; 
McKay  machine. 

McKay  machine,  use  of,  in,  160, 
161,  164,  167. 

processes  on  shoes  in  a  modern 
factory  in,  159-167. 

repairing,  modern  machines  for, 
in,  168,  169. 


specialization  in,  3,  159-167. 
summary  of,  125,  126. 
transition  from  Fi,  124,  125. 
welting  in,  159,  164,  167. 
See  also  Stages  of  Production, 
F2,  Goodyear  welt  machine. 

place  in  evolution  of  industry,  vii. 

Stoneham,  72,  208. 

Storekeeping  a  frequent  activitj'  of  shoe 
entrepreneurs,  45,  46,  48,  49,  55- 
57,  202  n.  2. 
Stoughton,  a  shoe  town, 
in  Ha,  132,  180. 
in  D,  72,  90,  208. 
in  F,  99. 

^ee  also  Avon  (E.   Stoughton);     W. 
Stoughton. 
Strong's  factory  at  Randolph,  99  n.  i, 
100  n.  2,  loi. 


Temple,  Josiah   H.,  History   of  North 

Brookfield,  182  n.  i,  200  n.  i,  201 

n.  I,  n.  2,  n.  4. 
Tobin,  John  F.,  General  President  of  the 

Boot  and  Shoe  Workers'  Union, 

quoted,  146  n.  i. 
Tools,  shoemaking,  mediaeval,  169.    See 

also  Stages  of  Production  (Ho,  Ha, 

Di,  D3),  tools. 
Towns,  development  of  new  from  old, 

17- 

Trades  in  New  England  in  1650,  con- 
temporary account  of,  170,  171. 

Twitchell,  Henry  Emmons,  of  Brookfield, 
entrepreneur  of  F,  114,  115  n.  2, 
116,  236-244. 


United  Shoe  Machinery  Co.  gives  repair 
outfit  to  U.  S.  Army,  1917,  168. 

United  States  Bureau  of  Labor  Statis- 
tics, Bulletin,  159-167. 

Unwin,  George,  Industrial  Organization 
in  the  i6th  and  lyth  Centuries,  26, 
27. 


INDEX 


293 


Wages,  see  Human  element,  wages. 
Wales,    Jonathan,    of    Randolph,    shoe 
merchant  in  San  Francisco,  in  D, 
89,  98,  99,  lOI. 
Ward,  Oliver,  of  Grafton,  inaugurator, 
as  early  entrepreneur,   of  D   in 
Brookfield,  22,  55,  57,  200-202. 
Wendell  family  of  Portsmouth  (N.  H.), 
entrepreneurs  of  early  D  who  were 
not  shoemakers,  37,  193-200. 
West  Indies, 

leather  imported  from,  in  D,  30. 
sale  of  Massachusetts  made  shoes  in, 
in  Di,  14,  29  n.  3,  34-36,  i44- 
in  D2,42,  50,  51,  59,  61,  62. 
inD3,  75,  no  n.  3,  144. 
in  Fi,  III. 
West  Randolph,  see  Randolph  (present 

name  of  town). 
West  Stoughton,  183. 

See  also  Avon  (E.  Stoughton) ;  Stough- 
ton. 
Weymouth,  a  shoe  town, 

early  conditions    in,  9,   13,   14,   137, 

178. 
in  D,  63,  72,  100  n.  i,  208,  211. 
inF,  loi. 
See  also  South  Weymouth. 


White,  Samuel,  of  Randolph,  expert 
pegger  of  late  D,  135,  136. 

White,  Timothy,  of  Nantucket,  teacher- 
shoemaker,  of  Ha,  12  n.  2,  173. 

Wilson,  Henry,  of  Natick,  entrepreneur 
of  Natick,  later  vice-president  of 
the  United  States,  v  n.  2,  68-71, 
132,  213-218. 

Winks,  William,  Lives  of  Illustrious 
Shoemakers,  128,  256  n.  i,  258  n.  i, 
261  n.  I,  262  n.  I. 

Woburn,  72,  190,  208,  211. 

Wolcott,  John  B.,  of  Natick,  entrepre- 
neur of  D,  53,  69  n.  3,  220. 

Women  as  shoeworkers,  see  Human 
element,  women. 

Wooldredge,  John,  of  Lynn,  entrepre- 
neur of  late  D,  78,  120. 

Woolen  industry,  development  of,  in 
England  compared  with  develop- 
ment of  American  boot  and  shoe 
industry,  26,  27. 

Worcester,  a  former  shoe  town, 
inD,  21,  33,  34,  72,  200,  210. 
inF,  147, 150. 

Worcester  county,  a  centre  for  boot  and 
shoe  industry,  21,  67,  81,  113, 
209,  210,  212. 


DATE  DUE 


3  1970  00544  864^ 


A  A      000  317  093    3 


